Grandmother’s Memory …

Grandmother had but one request before leaving Columbia for an assisted living facility in Atlanta.

She wanted to visit her mother’s grave.

Of course we will, I told her, knowing well that the visit most likely would be her last to the cemetery in the Cedar Creek community.  And, it was.

“Before we go, I need you to get the box out of the trunk of my car,” she said.  “We’ll need to take it to the cemetery with us.”

I knew not to ask a lot of questions.  Grandmother, my WW’s mother whose memory was being infected with dementia, was always direct with her requests.  Stubborn might be a better word.  Or, demanding.  But this request certainly was reasonable, one that my WW definitely wanted to please, and it did not hinder our plan for getting her to Atlanta – something she had strongly resisted when thinking straight.

But Grandmother no longer was thinking straight often enough to be on her own.  My WW had made arrangements for the disposition of her house on Betsy Drive and visited a dozen assisted living sites near us in Roswell before settling on the most suitable.  Grandmother knew nothing of the plan to move her until we sat alone in her small living room where curtains always were pinned back with clothespins so she could snoop on neighbors.  Her biggest fear was being put in a “damn nursing home” and I promised her we would never do that.  I simply told her it was time she lived with us a while.

Grandmother relented in her own way, never agreeing.  She picked up the phone and called her neighbor Ann.  “I guess I’m going to one of those places called assisted living,” she said.  “I love you. Bye.”  And that’s when she asked if I would take her to her mother’s grave before we left for Atlanta.

The ride to the Cedar Creek cemetery from Betsy Drive was about 45 minutes.  Along the way, Grandmother told me again she did not want to go to a nursing home.  I assured her we would not let that happen.  “Did you get that box out of the trunk of my car?” she asked.  “We’re going to need it at the cemetery.”  I told her I had the box and asked her what was in it.  “We’re going to decorate the cemetery,” she said.  “Mother would like that.”

I certainly was not going to press the point, but decorate the cemetery?  I turned into Cedar Creek Methodist Church, established 1743, and pulled up to the cemetery gate behind the church.  We walked to the Rabon family plot that was well defined by a short brick wall and a cyclone fence behind it. (See picture above of Grandmother, my WW and the cemetery.)  “We need to decorate that fence,” Grandmother declared as though she had planned this project for some time.  “Now, go get that box out of the car.”

Being the trusted son-in-law, I did as I was told.  I peeked inside the box before taking it from the car and saw an assortment of plastic flowers, strings of tinsel, what looked to be colorful Hawaiian leis, and a few other really tacky items.  Surely we weren’t going to . . . but we did.  We spent the next 45 minutes attaching all of those items to the fence, providing an incredibly gaudy backdrop.  Right when I started to think we could be arrested for this, I turned to Grandmother.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” she asked.

There was only one answer.  “Yes, Grandmother.  Indeed, it is beautiful.”

We then hurried to the car and drove off before the sheriff could arrive.  Grandmother asked why I was laughing.  “It’s nothing, Grandmother, really . . . nothing.”

The ride back, like this entire experience, was memorable.  While she did not remember being at the cemetery, she could vividly recall details from her childhood as we rode through areas from her past.  “My friends and I used to play in that backyard,” she remembered, pointing to a dilapidated house.  “We would hang clothes on the clothesline.”  She was sure of it.  And I thought to myself, that was probably 80 years ago.

Grandmother lived with us several weeks in Roswell while my WW finalized arrangements for a move to the assisted living facility just down the road from us.  My WW, as only she can do, insisted on a room near the front of the facility with a window so her mother could watch people come and go.  She even had the clothespins necessary to hold the curtains back – just like Betsy Drive.  “You know she’s very nosy,” my WW understated.  Furniture from Betsy Drive also made the assisted living suite more like home.

But Grandmother knew nothing of her reserved room at the assisted living facility.  And every time we broached the subject of assisted living her response was the same.  “Sounds like a nursing home,” she insisted.  But she also insisted on having her hair appointments – forever an important part of her life.  So, my ingenious WW made the next hair appointment . . . at the assisted living beauty parlor.  The day of the appointment, everybody was aware of our plan except Grandmother, who gazed at the interior of the nice facility as we walked her through the front doors and to the beauty parlor without a word.

“Everybody here is so nice,” Grandmother acknowledged as she left the parlor after having her hair done.  She then paused.  “This is so nice.  Is it one of those places you call assisted living?”  Risking the entire scheme, I encouraged her to “come along, we don’t have time to . . .”  But she stopped.  “Do you think we could look around?”  Which we did, finishing our tour at her suite where she remarked, “that even looks like some of my old furniture.”

And, it became her last home.

A couple weeks later, while taking a walk around the grounds, we stopped to get a view of the assisted living facility from atop a hill where she looked out with a smile.

“Isn’t it beautiful?” she asked.

There was only one answer.  “Yes, Grandmother.  Indeed, it is beautiful.”