Kim Priore

So much going on people…it’s a little ridiculous.  I’m 20 pages away from the end of the semester.  Well that and an exam in a class that I didn’t really attend or do the reading for the whole 2nd half of the semester.  But I’m not really worried about that too much.  I mean it’s Old Testament, how bad can it be, right?  Some battles, some kings, a spy-hiding prostitute thrown in there somewhere, a few words you never knew were a euphemism for genitalia…and some more battles.  That’s pretty much it.  You heard it here first, folks, the Hebrew Scriptures in 30 seconds or less, by KP.   But at the moment it’s the paper that’s tripping me up, I just have total writers’ block.  I know I’ll pull it off, because I always do, but the question is more can I pull it off sooner and have some breathing room, aka time to pack, before my trip to Israel?

Which leads us to…my trip to Israel!!!  I cannot even BEGIN to comprehend that I’ll be seeing Doug and Mandy in less than a week!  Not to mention Little Shanny!  Oh yeah, and the HOLY LAND!!!!  So that’s exciting.

But I’m kind of freaking out at how fast January has gone by.  I don’t know why, I thought I’d have way more time to get stuff done and see people.  It’s a little freaky to me that I start classes like the DAY after I get back, and then, aside from Spring Break, the next chunk of free time I have will be….after graduation.  So I’ll either be unemployed, or starting some yet to be determined new job.  And said job might not be here.  And that is really sad to me.  Things that are freaking me out, in no particular order: that I might have to move to DC, or elsewhere; that my parents will be (barring a miracle) eventually selling this house and moving out of Natick – what?!? No Priores in the Home of Champions?  That’s like, a crime!…That even when my brother does move back to this side of the globe, it may not be to this state, and even if he does, I might not be here! And even if I stay, Nan might go!  It’s just too much, people, too much change.  Too many unknowns.  Change is not my strong suit.  That’s putting it mildly, lemme ‘splain, no, there is too much, lemme sum up…change scares the ever-lovin’ crap outta me.

So I’m trying to just take things one day at a time, and not freak out too much about things that are out of my control.  But that’s sooo much easier said than done.  Much like 24, I feel like I can hear the giant ticking clock in my head, and it’s the countdown to who knows what.  And in reality, there’s no Jack Bauer to save me and solve the un-solveable problems.  So I guess we’ll just have to wait and see how this season, of life and of 24, plays out.

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Well, 4 hours of shopping, 2 days of cooking and decorating, and one day of clean up later, the 7 Fairview Priore New Years Extravaganza ™ is finally complete.  It was a little nerve-wracking, a little exhausting, and a LOT of fun.  There’s really nothing better (at least for a Priore) than having a house full of people, food, and laughter.  What I loved about this New Years, in no particular order:

-Spending time with my mom in the kitchen - brainstorming menu ideas, looking through cookbooks, and basically watching the Master in action.  No one puts a meal on the table like Sexy Sue, y’all, and if you don’t believe me, come on over, because we have a week’s worth of leftovers to prove it.

-The complete and total lack of drama.  It’s a wonderful thing when adults get together. 

-Watching my mother pantomime her way through ‘Catch Phrase’ and wondering if her friendship with BGH would survive, or if we would have a repeat of the infamous Fast Scrabble With Jamie Incident of 2000. 

-6 Words: Nintendo Wii on the Big Screen.

-Discovering 2 new wines I like – thank you JMG and KC.

-Watching family mix with old friends mix with new friends, and thanking God for every one of them.

-Celebrating new marriages, new babies on the way, new couples, and new friendships. 

-Watching SC try to devise a life plan for NG and me - you think it’s easy!  She discovered otherwise.

-True friendship = someone who will take custody of your phone and save you from ill advised phone calls and texts.

-The midnight CST call from Shan – a tradition dating back to the last millenium.

-Knowing that the same people who were there for me when my Nana passed and my brother left are the same people who can laugh and celebrate with me in the good times.  And knowing that together we will face whatever tough times and happy occasions lie ahead in the year to come.

I have literally no idea where I’ll be this time next year.  That makes ringing in the new year a little scary.  Life after June is one big black hole of uncertainty.  But I know my Redeemer lives, I know my family loves me, and I know that I am blessed with some incredible friendships.  As for the rest, well, we’ll just have to wait and see.

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In the musical “Rent,” the song “Seasons of Love” asks: “How do you measure a year? In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights, in cups of coffee. In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife…How about love?”  This song always runs through my head at the end of the year.  So in the absence of anything else interesting to blog about (I have been a big ol’ vacationing couch potato lately) I thought I’d add a few measures of my own.

Definitely in cups of coffee, that deserves to be seconded…in Frosties, McFlurries, in Pad Thais and beers…in weddings, and funerals, and trips with the Newsies…in movies, and plays watched, and shows on the Tivo…in dinners on the deck, breakfasts at Franny’s, and Friday night pizzas with the godsons…in campfires, in papers, and funny Shan stories…in songs sung (both in kareoke and in praise choir) and lessons learned…in friendships strengthened…in trials survived.

Using this system of measurement, one can only conclude that it’s been a good year.  It’s been chock full of things that will be remembered for a lifetime…Memphis, Arizona, DC, Haiti, Soulfest, NH…I’ve learned more about who I can trust and who I can’t, and those lessons have only made me stronger and made me appreciate all the more the friends who have hung in there.  I’ve remembered how to let go, how to say goodbye with grace and gratitude, and how to hope for the future. 

Happy New Year everyone!

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So here I am at the end of my extended Thanksgiving break (thank you, American Academy of Religion!) wondering how on earth I managed to get so little done with so much time off.  Things I did not get done include: grading all of my students’ papers, starting research for a paper that’s due in 2 weeks, mailing Shannon’s birthday present (tomorrow, I PROMISE!), any Christmas shopping at all, any cleaning at all (except cleaning the guest room, which as it turned out, was unnecessary).  Things that did get done include: spending a lot of time with family and friends, laughing a lot, crying a bit, celebrating a new marriage, eating a lot. 

The holidays are definitely going to be different this year.  Thanksgiving was no exception, but it was made infinitely more bearable by the presence of my beloved godsons, and by new additions to our table.  Nevertheless the empty seats were noticeable, and the distance and the loss deeply felt.  My brother’s blog post (http://trackdougandmandy.blogspot.com/) asked us, whose hands are you thankful for?  I too am thankful for our grandmothers’ hands, which served us so lovingly all those years, and for my mother’s, which still do.  I’m thankful for my dad’s, the hands that stubbornly refuse to be slowed by disease and whose roughness makes them no less gentle.  I’m thankful for my brother’s hands, as they hold the drumsticks and lead people into the presence of God.  I miss my sister-in-law’s hands beside me in the kitchen doing dishes after a family dinner, because they make the workload so much lighter and more enjoyable.

Looking ahead to Christmas, I know that it too will be different this year.  There won’t be the usual explosion of decorations at the Priore house, and well, the Hershey’s kisses wrappers will just have to lay bare on the floor without the tree to camouflage them.  But in thinking about it, it hit me that we always look at Christmas and the Incarnation from our perspective, love, peace, good will to men (and women) etc.  We seldom think about it from Jesus’ perspective.  For him it was a time of uncertainty, of discomfort in new and unfamiliar surroundings, and of intense separation from the Father whom he loved.  So I guess I’m going to try and make that my focus this year.  We always say that it’s not about the commercial, glitzy aspect of Christmas but about the “real meaning.”  And yet every year we get caught up in the busy-ness and forget the raw poverty and humanity of the first Christmas Eve.  But for once I guess I’m able to identify just a little better with that side of things.

On a much lighter note, I certainly would have gone off the deep end by now if it weren’t for friends who keep me sane (or insane, depending on how you look at it).  So for the dancing (both the wedding-related and Irish jig varieties), the witty text messages, the Best Guiness in Boston, Funny McLaugh-ersons (you know who you are), the church commentary over Chinese food, the Nog-drinking, the Grey’s-watching, and all other forms of amusement and sanity maintenance, I am deeply, profoundly, and infinitely grateful. 

One exciting feature of my social whirlwind break was attending a 90th birthday party for my grandmother’s best friend. I know, you’re jealous, I get invited to the best functions, it’s just part of being on the A-list.  But it was a great celebration of this woman’s life, put on by her friends and family.  They read messages from all over the country from people who couldn’t be there but wanted to share messages to, and memories of, Grace.  And it’s funny but none of these messages were all, Congratulations Grace on 90 years of life, and all that stuff you accumulated, all those things you accomplished, all those good grades you got.  People’s memories centered on happy times in Grace’s kitchen, holidays and family gatherings and cousins playing football.  So when we get to be 90, and we’re legally blind, and arthritic, and wearing the same outfit to our 90th birthday party that we’re wearing in pictures from our 80th (and who besides me is catty enough to notice that?) – we may not remember the things that we did or didn’t accomplish in the world’s eyes, but we’ll remember that we ate and laughed until our sides hurt and we weren’t sure from which.  So in that respect, I figure, it was a holiday break well spent.  Bring on the end of the semester.

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The non-FCCH readers are going to have to bear with me on this one, and will require a bit of explanation.  Of late, I have been dragged kicking and screaming into a little something called “40 Days of Community” ™, brought to you by the same people who brought you the Purpose Driven Life ™, the Purpose Driven Journal ™, and what I maintain *must* be out there somewhere, the Purpose Driven Lunchbox ™.  And right now you’re probably asking yourself, gee, what’s wrong with community?  Sounds like a great idea to me Kim.  Isn’t this just one more example of you being a cranky, hyper-critical bitch?  And this may very well be true.

I’m all for community, I really am.  In fact, I lived in it once for a year, an “intentional” one, to be exact, where I learned many valuable lessons that can be summed up in the Onion article entitled “Marxists’ Apartment a Microcosm of Why Marxism Doesn’t Work.”  (See especially the part about the organic peanut butter).  But seriously, I really did learn a lot, about myself, about community, about what our body of believers could and should look like.  We did it by studying the greats: Merton, Nouwen, Day, the Acts 2 community, others.  We did it not by stocking up on new books and dvds and posters, but by living life stripped down of the consumerist culture that we had known back home and looking to eachother for insights.  And I tried to bring those lessons back home with me and incorporate them into life here.  So I guess what really bugs me is the insinuation that I didn’t have “community” before this Hawaiian-shirt wearing dude came along and taught me all about it, in weekly installments of theological insights that can be summed up in 4 easy fill in the blank points that all happen to start with the same letter. 

I’m all for *real* community, not the manufactured kind.  I think Warren’s a great person who’s done some great things with his fortune, but I really can’t stand the cookie-cutter approach to life.  The one-size-fits-all, just add water, formulaic oversimplification. 

Some examples of real community, imho: friends who find comfort in a night of watching movies in your sweatpants (especially 6-hour movies involving Colin Firth, woo!); bailing one another out when you have car trouble (this mostly applies if you’re friends with JG and LT); friends who bring you Frosties and coffees; friends who are willing to indulge me in my overanalyzation of my personal life (or lack thereof); friends who are there after the wake’s over or the plane leaves.  What does not constitute community, imho: busying ourselves with a p.r. campaign to the point where we’re more concerned with what the outside world thinks of us, than those closest to us.

The small group’s been great, I really hope it continues, I hope we’re able to truly explore what real, radical, counter-cultural community looks like.  I guess what I’m saying is, the next time someone tells me we’re doing something for 40 days, I’m building an ark.

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Since I know I must have an overwhelming number of male readers…ok maybe a few?  no?  Well anyways, in case I ever get any, I thought that as a public service I could provide an advice column, in question and answer format in the spirit of Dear Abby.  So here goes.

Q: Dear Kim, once upon a time you and I sort of dated.  Not really in the true sense, we more had that tragic star-crossed ships in the night thing going.  Then I got another girlfriend and didn’t bother to tell you, and let you hear it from someone else, remember that?  That was fun.  So now I’m thinking of breaking up with said girlfriend, because, in a shocking twist of events, the distance is making things difficult.  If only someone I liked before had told me that distance would make a relationship hard.  Anyways, I’m really looking for advice, I have a hard time making decisions and I’d like someone to just tell me what to do.  I thought you’d be an excellent person to ask, and I thought I would do so by calling you up while you’re studying for midterms and dropping a lot of hints and fishing around for an answer. And then inquiring about your dating status.  Don’t you think this is an excellent plan?

A:  No, you dumbass.

That concludes the Advice for Guys portion of this week’s blog.  Tune in next week when our question might be, “Kim, is waiting around forever until the fencepole needs to be surgically removed from my butt and assuming someone will still be available, in fact, the best way to display interest in them?”  Here’s a sneak preview…the answer looks much like this week’s. 

Happy Friday everyone!

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Well boys and girls, I’ve been quite the world traveler lately, or at the very least, the East-coast traveler.  I don’t dare go much farther since a certain one-handed wonder who shall remain nameless is currently in possession of my St. Christopher’s medal, so it really wouldn’t be prudent.  On Thursday and Friday I was in sunny Florida…I’m guessing it was sunny, I was inside the hotel the whole time so it’s kinda hard to say.  I went there on business for one of my many jobs.  This is the one where I do research for the Bible Agencies.  That’s right, Kim in Florida, holed up in meetings for 2 days with CEOs of Bible Agencies.  What could possible go wrong?  Heh.  Well despite the multitude of possible answers to that question, I am proud to say that I was very well-behaved, and kept my liberal academic Ivy-league elitist mouth shut.  I know, right!  First time for everything.  I had to leave in the wee hours of the morning on Thursday, got to the airport in plenty of time, only to discover a mile-long security line.  At 6a.m.?  Seriously?  Ok, live and learn.  I still had plenty of time though and then….that’s right, you always knew I looked like a terrorist:  I got singled out for the pat-down (good morning!) and then they went thru my bag with a fine tooth comb.  Now I had done my homework and everything, or so I thought, I had nothing over 3 ounces and had it in a clear ziplock bag, but APPARENTLY I didn’t read closely enough, because you’re only allowed to have like 5 things.  I had like, 15.  So some poor long-suffering security guard had to stand there while I nearly cried trying to choose between like my MAC makeup and my Origins skincare stuff.  I mean could you choose between your kids?  Honestly.  I was like, I’m sorry, I know I’m being such a girl right now.  And he was like, oh that’s ok.  It’s just that this stuff is so expensive!  So by the time I was done with my reenactment of Sophie’s Choice, I had only 15 minutes till the flight left, i.e. 5 minutes till they close the door.  So this is where Kim, dancer/cheerleader extraordinaire, who NEVER runs if she can help it, breaks into an all-out sprint for the plane.  Prior to this I had been looking quite the consummate professional, in my nice purple linen Banana Republic pants and my freshly ironed and starched blouse.  By the time I arrived at the plane, I was a sweaty mess.  Lovely.

So it must have been during that time, i.e. when we moved from Sophie’s Choice to Chariots of Fire, that I ripped said linen pants.  I didn’t realize this until AFTER I had arrived at the Ft. Lauderdale airport, stopped off at the restroom, stopped in the gift shop and bought replacement toiletries for the ones I had to toss aside back in Boston, and was heading for the van with my driver.  THIS is when I realize that the hem of my pants, which before had maybe an inch-high slit on the side, was now split halfway up my leg.  Freken A.  I’m long past anywhere I can stop and buy a sewing kit.  So I get to the place I’m staying, which is a conference center run by one of the Bible Agencies, very nice but doesn’t have everything (like, for example, a sewing kit) that a normal hotel would have.  I even asked the cleaning crew, I was like, el safety-o pin-o?  No?  Gracias.  I’m like crap I am so screwed.  But THEN, I have the brilliant idea, aha!  I could staple it!  So I go down to the front desk, and I’m all, uhhh do you have a stapler I could borrow?  And the lady’s very nice, she’s all, here you go, and then I say, now, please ignore what I am about to do, and I disappear from her view, bend over, and staple my linen pants shut.  That’s right folks, a product of Wellesley and Harvard, roughly $150K worth of education stuffed inside this skull and counting, and she’s got staples holding her pants together.  Awesome.

So other than that, the Florida trip was a success and I met some cool people and got to spend some quality time with EM, so that’s always fun!  This weekend I headed up to North Woodstock, New Hampshire for the Annual Priore Family Columbus Day Weekend Leaf-Peeping Extravaganza ™.  Now new and improved, featuring Goedharts and VanderArks and Giffords, oh my!  I had lots of fun playing with the godsons and drinking beer around the campfire and staring at the foliage.  And eating.  Lots of eating.  I think I gained like 20 pounds this weekend.  But at least if I split my pants I’ll know what to do.

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Well, week 2 of school is officially over, and I am exhausted.  Mostly, it’s exhausted in that really good, really accomplished-feeling way.  There’s quite a bit of sleep deprivation in there too.  I definitely spent the home stretch of the week running on pure adrenaline and caffeine.  At one point I had the random urge to take up smoking (don’t worry I didn’t) which in the past I’ve only felt compelled to do when I’m drinking, or in the middle of finals.  I’m not sure what that means.

The most exciting development of the week was a guest lecture in my Development class on “Monitoring and Evaluation” which is a fancy way of saying “what I did with my summer vacation, and apparently did all wrong.”  Ok well maybe not all wrong.  But as it turns out there’s a whole profession/industry/career path within Development that involves that type of thing.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is, it doesn’t appear to be the career path I’m on.  I can see it, it’s like it’s running parallel to me, and I just can’t quite make the leap.  So if I ever decide to go back for a second Master’s degree (and you really never know when you’re going to have $40,000 lying around and not know what to do with it) I know what I’ll go for.  But so then I said all of this to my work study boss (also known as the professor I’m TFing for, also known as random lady who thinks I’m smart and really wants to get me a job, for reasons passing understanding) and she goes, “oh I should introduce you to my neighbor, he’s an independent consultant and just got contracted by the Clinton foundation to evaluate their HIV/AIDS program.”  What?!?!?  So like, here I was questioning my decision to go to Harvard and not Fletcher, and yet if I wasn’t at Harvard, I wouldn’t have met Rachel and had all these cool opportunities, not to mention the ones she still wants to find for me.  At any rate, it’s just been this weird feeling of things coming together incrementally, and this vague sense that like even though I don’t know exactly what I’ll be doing after May, I’m cautiously optimistic that I’m *sort of* on the right track. 

So that brings me to Friday night.  My loan money came in (wohoo!) so I got to do a little shopping this afternoon after lunch with my mentor, always fun.  On both counts.  And since then I’ve pretty much been staring vacantly at the tv.  I was going to try and rally and catch up on some work or reading, but I think I might just give myself a pedicure and take a bath and turn in early.  I got myself a small pizza for dinner, which I used to feel was really pathetic, but now I just chose to think of it as an emblem of how I’m really ok with who I am, and I don’t need to pretend that I have plans to go out and party it up, I’m really ok with the folks at Liberty’s pizza knowing that I’m heading home to spend Friday night by myself.

But it’s a good reminder to me too, that at the end of a busy week where I feel like a rock star and like I’ve definitely made Harvard my bitch and I’m just kickin’ butt and takin’ names…it doesn’t mean a whole lot of you don’t have anyone to enjoy it with.  This is not to say that on this particular evening I would have gone out anyway (no guilt trip to anyone intended!), but I guess it’s good in the midst of our “40 Days of Community” (insert eye roll here) to remember that I can have the longest most impressive resume in the world, but if my friends are hurting and I don’t take time out to be there for them, or to pull my weight as a member of this family and this household, then I’m really not that great at all.  So my goal is to keep all of that in focus. 

Happy Friday everyone!

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So school is off and running with a bang!  I started my Development course at Tufts last week, and this week started the rest of my courses at the good ol’ H-bomb.  So far I like them, I’m taking one on the theological and ethical issues raised by Hurricane Katrina and other catastrophes, and one on the struggle within Islam between moderates and extremists.  And I have to take an Old Testament class, to fulfill a requirement.  Because apparently 9 years of Christian school and 4 years as a religion major at Wellesley does not give me enough of a grasp of Scripture.  But whatever, it will be good to brush up, and obviously from a much different perspective than like, Mr. Schaaf’s junior high Bible class.  All of this in addition to my 2 jobs, which combine for a total of 20 hours a week.

Then I get an email from my work study boss, offering me a position as a teaching fellow in one of her courses, it’s on religion and international politics.  It’s an amazing opportunity – TFs are by and large PhD students, not lowly Masters’ candidates.  It would look good on a resume.  And the money’s good.  But Kim, you say, don’t you already have 2 jobs and a full course load, and isn’t this basically like taking a 5th course, since you’d have to do all the reading so as to be able to lead a discussion section?  Why yes, I say.  So Kim, you say, clearly you would be insane to take on this additional responsibility.  Well, I say, you clearly did not go to Wellesley.  You don’t share this pathological (yes that’s the correct use of the term) need to overachieve.  You believe in things like free time, a social life, having fun on the weekends, getting 8 hours of sleep a night.  I am very envious of you.

The thing is, this is very 21-year-old Kim of me.   Very Wellesley Kim.  A lot of you did not know Wellesley Kim, you have come into my life since.  You probably wouldn’t recognize her.  She was lean, hungry, ambitious, motivated.  She survived on like 4 hours of sleep a night.  29-year-old Kim, by comparison, has grown fat, lazy, complacent, and her goal is to marry rich.  I feel like I’ve suddenly traveled back in time.

Ultimately, what it comes down to is that in addition to wanting to feel *slightly* better about myself when I read the Class Notes section of the Alum Magazine and read about classmates who have like gone to law school, hiked Everest, started their own nonprofit, gotten married, and had kids, it really is an amazing opportunity and too good to pass up.  This is IF it all works out, and I hope I’m not jinxing it, I feel like someone in the administration is going to get the paperwork and realize this prof has overlooked the fact that I’m a total moron.  And besides, if the Sox made the playoffs this fall, I wouldn’t be getting much sleep anyway.  So really I figure I’m just using my allotted playoff sleeplessness for a slightly less noble cause. 

At any rate, if you don’t see much of me over the next few months it’s because I’m passed out drooling on a book somewhere.  I’ll pencil you in for some time in January.  Feel free to stop by the house, please bring coffee.  Thanks.

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I know it’s been a month, and my grace period of being “The Bereaved” is coming to an end…I know this is the point when people start to expect you to suck it up and move on, to not require the extra attention, to just be normal again.  (A special shout-out here to my friends that recognize that 1, I’ve never been normal, and 2, I just need a little more time to process things in my way.  So anyways, I realized I never did this, I wanted to post the remarks I made at my Nana’s funeral, just for those of you who knew her, and for those of you who didn’t, maybe you can have just a glimpse of why this special person leaves such a big gaping hole in my heart and my life.  So here it is:

My job this morning is to give some words of remembrance for my Nana Phyllis.  So I thought that I would do just that, that I would offer some words that come to mind when I think of Nana.

 

The first is Imagination.  When we were little, my brother and I loved going to Nana’s house because it always meant playing games.  We played school, office, hair salon, had tea parties, and drank ginger ale from goblets pretending it was champagne.  These games were never treated as frivolous, or as something we did in the other room while she tended to more important matters.  Nana was right in the thick of our fantasies with us.  Nana’s house was a place of imagination, where we could be whoever we wanted and go wherever we wanted and where we learned how to dream.

 

The next word is Curiosity.  Nana had an insatiable curiosity about the world around her.  She loved to read the papers that Doug and I wrote in college.  She would pour over every photograph we brought back from a trip, asking a million questions.  She taught us how to be inquisitive, and not to be ashamed of what we didn’t know, because there was never any harm in asking.

 

Music: of course, the music.  I’ll always remember sitting beside her playing our duet of ‘Chopsticks,’ or hearing her play “You’re a Grand Ole Flag” and finish with a big flourish.  She’d often say she could hear the music in her head and while she wasn’t gifted with a singing voice, she’d try and squeak it out anyway to let you know what song she was talking about.

 

Affection – Nana was always affectionate to those around her, whether it was her coworkers, family, or friends.  We joke about how she always came up with nicknames for our friends:

Nancy with the Pretty Hair, Little Shanny, My Josh, or of course my old boyfriend Ryan, who she always called Kevin, because he looked like a Kevin.

 

Independence.  Nana prized her independence, it’s why she loved her car so much, it gave her the freedom she always wanted.  And she was never anxious for me to have a boyfriend, never urged me to get married the way some grandmothers might, and for most of my life she modeled for me the role of an independent, capable career woman.  For her generation that was somewhat revolutionary, and to have her as a role model taught me to value myself for who I am, not just what I can be to someone else.  Although I still wouldn’t mind having a boyfriend.

 

Pride.  Nana was proud of being an American, proud of being from

Natick, proud to be a part of the Congregational Church.  And she took tremendous pride in her family.  Her example taught us to value where we came from and who we are. 

 

Life.  She loved bright colors, energetic music, she had no use for anything “draggy” or dark or dismal.  She knew how to squeeze every last drop of enjoyment out of the smallest things, whether it was a meal (“Are you gonna eat that?”) or simply watching my brother wash the car. 

 

One word that doesn’t make sense in the context of my grandmother is Goodbye.  Toward the end of her life when I would visit Nana in the nursing home, when it was time for me to leave, she would say “I’m not gonna watch you out of sight.”  Because it made her too sad to see me go.  And that’s how I feel today.  So I’m not gonna watch you out of sight, Nana, I’m going to remember you as you were, sitting by your piano or enjoying a cocktail at our Christmas gatherings with the VanTassels.  And I know that your imagination, curiosity, affection, pride, and love of music and life will stay with me always.  And I hope I can continue to make you proud.

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