Honoring Grandma Trudy
Honoring Grandma Trudy
I wonder how it feels to know death is near. Does it hurt? Does it tingle? I wonder how it sounds to know death is near. They say our sense of hearing is the last to leave us. Does the world grow quiet? Does it sing?
I wonder how it tastes and how it smells. Can we detect either sense at all?
I wonder how a human being can be so moved that she produces a single tear, one that falls down her soft and wrinkled skin, only seconds before her heart beats for the very last time. What was so moving? What allows a dehydrated body, one that has survived without a single drop of water for nearly four days, to produce a tear that washes its tired eyes before they close forever? What did her eyes see? Who?
If I could ask my Grandma Trudy these questions, I would do so over a bowl of her homemade chili, made from canned tomatoes grown in the Ohio countryside. But, death does not allow us to solve its mysteries, as thoroughly as we might investigate. It does not allow us to know for certain how it fills us. How it captures us. How it moves us so profoundly that our dehydrated bodies can still muster a tear when there isn’t a single drop of water left to nourish us.
Grandma Trudy passed away peacefully on Tuesday, April 05, 2022. She was surrounded by family from near and far throughout her final hours on Earth. Her nurse kissed her forehead as she reminded her how beautiful she was, as she repositioned her fatigued body and tucked her into bed. I know this to be true because I witnessed it. I witnessed compassion and surrender and deep, gutting love like I never have before Tuesday, April 05, 2022, a love so deep and so gutting that it feels nearly impossible to willingly release. We grasp ahold of it as if it might fall from the world’s highest cliff. We commit our lives to it when we find it ourselves. We fly across the country, sometimes the world, to celebrate it. We gather our closest friends and co-workers to support those who lose it. We forget, for a moment, that a love so deep and so gutting never truly leaves us at all. It never falls from the world’s highest cliff. It never falls because it exists beyond us. It exists through us. It exists in the words of our stories and memories, our essays and recipes. It is always present. It is always alive.
Love, like the love I felt from my Grandma Trudy, feels very, very tender. It is the dance of the morning’s sunrise through dewey leaves. It is the final petal to fall from a spring bouquet of bright tulips. It is the constriction of our throats when our hearts have been broken.
And honor…honor feels very, very big. Honor fills a room. It is the eldest, wisest member of a family. It is oldest, tallest tree in a misty, lush forest. It is an 86-year-old woman who holds onto her breath for her family alone when she herself is ready to take flight.
Grandma Trudy was a wife, mother, and grandmother of love and honor. She was tender and big. Her presence softened us as it filled the room.
She was an absolute force. Though, she was a quiet force. She was not loud in order to earn notoriety or respect, and yet she had both. She earned notoriety and respect because of who she so naturally was: a person I will spend my life celebrating.
Grandma Trudy was consistent. She called me on my birthday, first thing in the morning, every year for 31 years. I vividly remember building in extra time before leaving for middle school on my birthday because I knew she would call. When I cheered for our high school basketball team, she would offer to take me to Wendy’s after each home game for chili and a frosty. I learned to avoid making plans after home games because, even as a too-cool-for-school teenager, I always wanted to go to Wendy’s with my grandparents. She arrived at every celebration and holiday with delicious, homemade food but was never the first to eat. Grandma Trudy was so consistent.
Grandma Trudy was present. There wasn’t a single family event we had without our Grandma Trudy. Every game. Every birthday. Every Christmas. Every graduation. Every wedding. Every bridal shower. Every baby shower. When I say “every”, I mean every. If our family gathered, she was there. Grandma Trudy was so present.
Grandma Trudy was unfailingly supportive. I could have called and told her I was going to attempt to cartwheel my way to the moon while wearing a blindfold and ankle weights, and she would have said, “Well, gee. How about that? Doesn’t that sound nice? Keep me posted, will you?” Any time I called her to share news or a new goal, she believed in me immediately. She held onto newspaper clippings and hung them on her refrigerator. She called to congratulate me on my grades, even when they weren’t perfect. Grandma Trudy was so supportive.
Grandma Trudy passed her pride and joy to others. When she felt joy, she would invest it into her loved ones. This was her default setting. Wiley Canning Company is named after my Grandma Trudy. I am currently writing my first book: The Wiley Canning Company Cookbook. Exactly one week before she passed away, I sent her a photo of my book cover once we were already on the phone. The book cover has her maiden name, Wiley, across the front in bold letters. She said, “Wow. The Wileys would be so proud.” I said, “Gram! YOU are a Wiley! That’s you!” But, she immediately passed her pride and joy to her loved ones. Until the very end of her time on Earth, she did this.
Grandma Trudy was a fantastic chef. There was not a single eulogy spoken at her Celebration of Life that did not focus on her love of cooking, baking, canning, pickling, and preserving. More than any other way, she loved her family through delicious, homemade food. Her chili? The world’s best. Her chocolate chip cookies? Iconic. Her canned tomatoes and peaches? A true spiritual experience. She loved her family so well through food. I shared this truth with one of her nurses, Lynette, the day she passed away. As our conversation was ending, Lynette said, “Your grandmother! Oh, she is just so yummy.” I said, “Lynette, I have to tell you…I have described her food as yummy time and time again, but this is honestly the first time anyone has ever described my grandmother herself as yummy. She is yummy. Thank you for that.”
Throughout this season of life, as a new mother myself, what stands out to me most is how committed she was as a grandmother. When I was pregnant with Sullivan, my husband, Jared, and I had dinner over Zoom with two close friends. They were also new parents. So, as expectant parents do, we asked them question after question about what it was like to be parents. “How are you sleeping?” “Do you plan routine date nights?” “Do your parents just love being grandparents?” They paused and then responded, “Well, not exactly. Grand parenting isn’t necessarily their thing.” Upon hearing this, Jared and I were genuinely shocked. Neither of us could imagine this feeling. But, as it turns out, it’s quite common actually. Grand parenting isn’t for everyone. The reason we were completely shocked when we learned this is because our grandparents were truly the best grandparents. The MVPs of all grandparents. The most consistent, present, supportive, joy-investing, and yummy grandparents. Grand parenting was Grandma Trudy’s love language. It was, most definitely, her thing.
In the wake of her passing, I’ve written quietly about how I might honor her life and legacy. But, like love, honor exists beyond us. It exists through us. It exists within us because it was planted there long, long ago—long before Grandma Trudy mustered a tear when there wasn’t a single drop of water left to nourish her. I know this to be true, again, because I witnessed it.
In April 2017, Jared and I planned to drive the famed Highway 1 along the coast of southern California. Weeks before we planned to leave, devastating mudslides swept the region. We adjusted our plans and ultimately found ourselves in central California at the entrance of Muir Woods, home to ever-impressive redwood trees, ranging in age from 500 years old to 1,200 years old. The tallest redwood in Muir Woods is 258 feet tall; its height is just shy of a 26-story building. This tree, a tree that is older than the United States and reaches nearly 26 stories into the sky, was grown from a seed no larger than the seed that grew Grandma Trudy’s tomatoes in the Ohio countryside. As a redwood dies, its roots begin to sprout in a circular shape around its base. Over the course of several years, a perfect circle of new redwoods grows around the redwood that has passed away. What remains is an enclosed sanctuary of redwoods that exists and grows because and only because a single redwood lived and died in its exact place. Long before the parent redwood took up its final drop of water, it created a family of redwoods to love and honor its place in this misty, lush forest. It created a family of redwoods to love and honor its life and legacy. Honor exists because the redwood first existed. Honor exists because Grandma Trudy first did, too.
As your throat constricts when your heart has been broken, know this is love. When your loved one holds onto her breath when she herself is ready to take flight, know this is honor. And when you find yourself swallowed by grief, know the love and honor that exists beyond and within you will lift you as high as the tallest redwood before you, one day, create a sanctuary in your exact place, too.
