7. My Grandmother

And so my mother remarried, nothing fancy, they went to Las Vegas and got hitched while us four girls stayed at home with my grandmother.  I never had any really bad memories of my grandmother, but my older sister does remember a couple of times when my grandmother and grandfather had us girls and they would go to the local watering hole and leave us in the car while they had a couple of drinks.  But when my grandfather was alive they would take us to the local Moose Lodge whenever there was anything going on.  We went to Halloween parties where the apples were hung from the ceiling and the first one to finish eating the apple won.  I would have much rather dunked my head for an apple though.  Bobbing for apples always seemed way more appealing to me.  There was always something going on at the Moose Lodge so we were grateful for that.

My grandmother baked a lot, she made fried doughnuts, bread and a wonderful dish that I later found out they called Danish Apple Pudding, and she made a wonderful little candy called divinity.  I have never had any that compared to what my grandmother made and alas, besides the apple pudding recipe, everything else was lost.  She never learned to drive, I don't know if my grandfather just didn't have the patience, or if she was just afraid to drive.  But I'm sure that this closed her life in even more.  She just loved all of her grand kids, and would do almost anything my mom or aunt wanted if it involved us kids. 

She called me her "Dolly" and I miss her to this day.  I wish that her life had been different and more of an adventure for her.  Losing her son at such an early age, 16, right when his life would become his own, devastated both of my grandparents.  My grandfather died right around when I was 8 or 9.  That was it, she had nothing else to live for.  She didn't do much but sit at the kitchen table drinking coffee and smoking  a cigarette.  Her only vice at that point in her life was to go play bingo, and she loved bingo.   I really wish that she would have remembered that she had two daughters and between them 7 grand kids.  That is when I really started missing her, although  I was grateful that she was around to see me get married, she died the very next year.  My older sister had two children before my grandmother passed away, I'm so glad she got to see that.