What she taught me (entry #1)

She taught me to NEVER eat with my elbows on the table.
She taught me to always cross my ankles, never my legs (only whores do that).
She taught me that little dogs are excrutiatingly annoying (since she had one that hated everyone except her).
She taught me to seal up cereal in a plastic container, otherwise bugs will get into it.
She taught me to always say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’.
She taught me that a woman must take care of her appearance, at all times.
She taught me to love pinepple and mayonnaise sandwiches.
She taught me to need other people’s approval to find meaning in my own life.
She taught me that women can be strong without a man.
She taught me that women shouldn’t have to be strong without a man.
She taught me to decorate with an overwhelming amount of ducks.
She taught me to trust no one, but appear as though I trusted everyone.
She taught me that blood is not, in fact, thicker than water.
She taught me to stick up for people who don’t deserve it.
She taught me patience.
She taught me impatience.
She taught me forgiveness.
She taught me intolerance.

And she died yesterday.

At 1:30pm eastern time. Alone. In a nursing home. Never having asked for our forgiveness for her coldness and abandonment.

I’m not sure I could have given it to her.

She was flawed. Silly. A product of a world that had died w/ General Robert E. Lee, but was unwilling to let go of the dream of a cultured and elegant South.

I didn’t cry. She turned her back on us in 1989. She had no love in her eyes when I pounded on her door at 11pm that night in 1998, begging her to call my father so I could see him. She never even looked at my daughter, her great-granddaughter, my angel.

I’m sorry my father grieves. I’m sorry she died alone, but she created the world she lived in.

This feels cold-hearted, to me, but it’s how I feel. She was my grandmother. "Gramma Jean" we called her once upon a time. She doted on me, the little princess with the perfect southern accent and perfectly curled, golden hair and brown eyes a person could drown in. I was her chance to show everyone that the South could still be instilled, in the children, and I perfectly imitated all she asked of me.

Then he left, and she turned her back. We were unimportant compared to her son. If he didn’t want us, neither did she. Besides, we were tainted with "Yankee" blood, thanks to my mother (sheesh).

I showed her.

I eat with my elbows on the table, cross my legs like a whore (even in short skirts), hate little dogs, barely remember to put cereal away, have a hard time saying please and thank you (even harder is sorry!), barely wear make-up (much less care how I look usually) and I hate ducks, feverently.

But some things… they’ve stuck.

I still (much to my surprise) like pineapple and mayonnaise sandwiches.
I still need other people (a select few, to be truthful) to approve of me in order for me to approve of myself.
I still have my core of strength, without a man, but desire to have a man so I don’t have to strain it to horribly.
I still struggle with true trust of others, so I frequently put on a good face.
I still embrace those of my chosen family more than those I’m related to. (In my defense, they are better people, generally.)
I still stick up for the underdog.
I’m still patient but frantic, forgiving but intolerant.

I don’t know what any of that means. I could never go back. I used to dream of moving back to the South. Now I know the midwest(North) is in my bones.

Maybe it means the North wins (again)?

*sigh*
Tia