I have sat down at my computer to try and write a eulogy for my grandmother and I don't know where to begin. How do I sum up a lifetime of loving someone in a few paragraphs? How do I make people understand that, beneath her cranky, opinionated exterior, she was kind and funny and so special to me?
Sometimes when people die, it seems they are immediately sainted by those they left behind. I will not be doing that. It would be a disservice to her to suddenly describe her as a sweet old lady that always had a kind word for everyone. That was not the case. She was not everyone's friend, but she was mine. She had opinions about things, even if they were based on nothing more than her unexamined beliefs. She was a Catholic who liked to go to church on Saturday night to get it out of the way. Much of what she did was based on a feeling of duty and on being a disciplined person.
As a kid, she was the best person to take care of me when I was sick. She would make up the couch into a cozy bed, hang a little plastic bag off the edge of the cushion (she would not tolerate my tissues making a mess of her floor) and make sure I had lots of fluids to drink in a tall glass, sensibly rested atop a coaster as to not leave a water mark on the wooden end table. When I woke up she'd fix me soup or grilled cheese or anything else I asked for. This was how she showed her love best: through food.
I'm not sure what I will say about her when I stand up in a few days, but I'm sure of what I want people to know. I want them to know she loved people and was loved in return, however imperfectly it came across. She did the best she could with the time she was here and that's really all we can hope for.
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