Always in my memories

There is never a time that I don’t drive past her yellow house in Meteghan and think about her.

I thought about her the last time I drove past her old house. And the time before that.

And the time before that. A friend of mine recently posted a photo of her 98-year-old grandmother on Facebook. Her grandmother and I have already blocked a date that when she turns 100 I’ll be there to take her photo for the Vanguard. We compare our notes on the countdown whenever I see her.

When I see photos or hear stories of other people’s grandmothers, it reminds me of mine – Estelle Belliveau of Church Point who died soon after I started university in September 1987, and Regina Comeau, who died in 2009. Recently I came across a column that I had written in 2008 about my Grandmere Comeau. I thought I’d share it again. Just because.

REMEMBERING MY

GRANDMERE

For years, she hasn’t remembered me on sight, but it always surprises me when my Grandmere Comeau asks about my husband. “Is Greg still fishing?” she’ll ask, following up with, “He was always a fine-looking young man.”

I guess that explains why she remembers him.

You’d think I’d register more than a passing glance. Instead it’s usually more of a pained expression. I see her studying my face, searching for some spark of familiarity, when my mother says, “Do you know who this is? It’s Tina.” “Ah, yes,” she’ll say nodding her head. I smile, knowing that sometimes she remembers me, but most of the time she doesn’t. So I remember for both of us.

I remember being in her house in Meteghan – her downstairs and me upstairs in the room that had the peek-a-boo vent hole in the floor over the kitchen. What I don’t remember is how many times as a kid I’d yell out, “Hello!” thinking she hadn’t seen me. Because, of course, she’d pretend that she hadn’t.

I remember her stuffing. Weird, that I’d remember that. But I liked the taste of it. And she always had great cookies in the pantry.

And I vividly remember in the corridor of the Yarmouth hospital – after days of watching my grandpere slip away from cancer in the early 1990s – the way she squeezed my hand when my uncle Bernie walked down the hallway and simply said to her in a whisper, “C’est fini.”

I can still hear her exhale that heavy sigh.

But these days what I remember most about my grandmere is what she doesn’t. My children, and how much she loved my boys. She would sit in her rocking chair in the kitchen and giggle and laugh when we’d stop in for visits. She was always thrilled when I’d bring her pictures of the kids. And I don’t know who squeezed harder during a hug with my boys.

She’d play tug-of-war with them in the living room using a roll of red yarn. And like she did with me for all of those years, she’d ‘jump’ in surprise when the kids yelled out to her from that vent in the floor above, “Here we are.”

So I can live with the fact that she doesn’t remember me.

But it breaks my heart that she can’t remember them.

She still giggles and laughs when they’re around. But it’s really just an old woman enjoying the visit of two children. Not like it was before when it was Grandmere Comeau visiting with Jacob and Justin.

Which is why one day, a year earlier, I was so happy when grandmere asked my mother, “How is Jacob doing in school?” Coincidentally just minutes later the kids and I just happened to stop by for a visit at Villa Acadienne in Meteghan where she was living. “There he is!” she said excitedly as Jacob walked through the door. I’m certain my jaw hit the floor, before a smile took over my face.

My grandmother turned 94 the week I wrote this column. Because of her Alzheimer’s was never excited to see me anymore when I walked through the door.

But that’s okay, because I remember she used to be.