A Plea to Grandparents*

*and anyone else loved by someone who wants you to stick around

Please don’t smoke.

Or if you do, please try to quit.

Please never stop trying to quit.

Please don’t drink.

Or if you do, please try to quit.

Please, please never stop trying to quit.

Because in choosing not to try to quit,

most of my grandparents chose to quit me.

They didn’t mean to,

but that doesn’t change how things went -

how my memories of them

are fuzzy at best

and nonexistent at worst;

how stories I’ve heard about them

either make my heart break

over how good of friends we could’ve been

or make my heart break

over how scary it would have been

to know them.

Nobody wants to only have stories

as their main memories of barely-met loved ones,

and to feel jealous after the telling

when the tellers just want to share

so you hear an echo

of what you don’t have.

Or at least I don’t want that.

Nobody wants to have reasons

to be afraid of someone

that our most true instincts tell us

should be our partners in crime,

not the violence that was the reality,

but the sort of harmless mischief

that is our defiance

of age trying to tell us who our friends should be.

Or at least I don’t want that.

But sometimes we get what we don’t want.

And sometimes people learn too late

that some…

thing…

they wanted

and felt they couldn’t give up

would eventually take them away

from some one they would want more.

Or at least someone, some me,

who would want them more.

So, please,

from every wide-eyed child

who wants someone to run to, giggling,

from every teenager

who wants someone to whisper to

about the things that are hard to say out loud,

from every adult

who, whether they have their own children or not,

wants to be a grandparent to someone,

to live in the role they wish had been more filled for them -

Please

take care of yourself

because you’ll also be giving us more time with you.

Please

don’t stop growing as a soul

because you’ll give us light when we feel stuck.

Please

love God in every possible way

because we want to be with you

in the beginning of everything to come

like you were part

of the beginning of us.

Please.

Background:

I was blessed, and continue to be blessed, by having had my mom’s mom, my Nana, around until I was 24. She was a godly and kind woman, a determined and hardworking woman; she is not only my genetic ancestor, but also my spiritual ancestor because she taught and modeled the faith to my mother, who in turn partnered with my dad to teach and model the faith to me.

My other three grandparents, however, were not with me very long, and I felt that absence. Still do sometimes.

My paternal grandmother was a tender-hearted Christian woman with an unfortunate penchant for choosing husbands with abusive habits; sadly, she also had a smoking problem and was diagnosed with lung cancer, quit smoking too late, and died before I turned two. I was her first grandchild, the only one she met, and my parents’ theory is that she hung on to life months past what her doctors predicted in order to be with me longer.

My paternal grandfather was an abusive alcoholic who I believe I met a total of twice; I only remember the second time when I was seven and we visited him in the hospital a few days before he died from throat cancer, likely related to his drinking and smoking habits. He was mostly alone, and definitely estranged from my dad and his siblings, as well as his multiple other children, my dad’s half-siblings.

My maternal grandfather was a family man with a wide variety of hobbies, interests, and experiences; I think we would have been big pals. (He was a poet, too, in addition to being a pilot, a photographer, a slalom car racer, a Marine, and a random facts collector.) He, similar to the other two, smoked and died from related complications, specifically emphysema and heart disease, this time when I was six.

It’s not something I dwell on all the time, but whenever they come to mind, I do wish they would have made different choices and that I could have been true friends with them.

As a result, with this poem, I want to plead with grandparents and parents and any adults who are role models to people younger than them (which is everyone, whether they realize it or not) to not make choices that have a high chance of shortening your life or that turn you into a person who has an overall damaging effect on the younger people around you.

Only God knows when we are supposed to die, but our free will and choices have results - maybe my three grandparents could have been around longer. Maybe they unknowingly brought their time of death closer than it had to be. There are so many ways to do that, not just smoking and being addicted to alcohol - eating unhealthily, being sedentary, wasting most of our lives away on useless entertainments, all these and more are dangerous, too. This poem speaks to me as much as anyone. I want to make better choices to be around longer and be more present for the souls whose orbits overlap with mine.

Whenever you have to leave behind those who look up to you, please, please, please don’t let it be a result of things you chose and didn’t have to. Try to stay and try to be a blessing to them. God will take care of us either way, but we long for you to be part of our stories and to be beautiful parts that we can look back on with thankfulness and not wistful regret.

Wishing you goodness without end,

Jess

P.S. - Y’all, this one was so unexpectedly cathartic. I meant to just write down the idea for this one to work on later, but I ended up writing the rough draft in one sitting, and just criiiiiied and typed, crrrrrried and typed. It was so surprising - I’ve never felt an overwhelmingly or unbearably intense grief (that I can recall) over the losses of these three grandparents (I was so young), just usually a consistent, steady, simmering sadness when I would think about them. (And, I admit, sometimes gentle anger at them for choices they made.) Overall, very manageable-feeling, very “it is what it is,” so that ninja attack of tears just karate chopped me in the emotional throat, you know. Kinda disrespectful, but beneficial nonetheless.

Writing this poem-letter out, thinking about the adultier adults in my family and the various health issues going on, etc. - I just want them, and everyone, to know, from a grandchild’s perspective, how much we want them to care enough and be intentional enough to try to stay and to try to be people who are good for us, truly “grand” for us. And for them to know what might be in store for their grandchildren and younger loved ones if they make choices that lead to them leaving before they have to - that wistful regret I mentioned before, what I’ve felt since I was old enough to start understanding what I missed out on.

Let’s not be a reason people miss out, if we can help it. If they have to miss us, let’s try our best for it not to be because they never really knew us and wish they could have, but let it be because they got to know us, they love who we are and who we’re becoming, and they can’t wait to see us again.