Grandpa!

I spent an hour talking with Grandpa tonight.  We have a special bond that was born when I lived with him and Grandma for a year during college.  My grandparents heard the uncensored Miriam that year, instead of the putting the best foot forward to make them proud sort of Miriam that I had been before then.  They would ask me for my "cool-collected opinion" of various situations and I'd give it.  I'd ask the same of them .  I painted Beer steins with Grandma, and attended the book club she hosted for her friends.  I did yard work with Grandpa and helped him clean the basement after the sewer line got clogged.  He secretly got me a Cummings chocolate Easter egg when they were in season (food of the gods) but told me I couldn't let on to the cousins or he'd have to get them all one.

I love that year.  I guess during a time when most late adolescents are getting to know themselves, I was getting to know my grandparents instead.  And they got to know me.  It was a good year.  They learned to trust my opinion and I learned to trust theirs.

Tonight, as I was talking to Grandpa, he talked a lot about Grandma (their wedding anniversary would have been yesterday).  He told me about the last time they went to California together, that "Mr. Toad's Wild Ride" was one of his favorites at Disneyland and he told me about their trip to Washington when I was a baby and they came to see me and my parents (and Marie too).  He asked how James was and I told him that James is dating a nice girl who is going on a mission soon.  I also told him I'd argued with James and not gone for sushi with him and his girlfriend.  He said "Well, if she is a nice girl, she deserves to go on dates without you there."

I think he's right.