Ten Years Ago Today..

I really have a hard time believe it's been ten years ago since my grandmother, my mom's mother (Nannie, as we called her), passed away from lung and brain cancer. So much has changed in the last ten years within our family, some of it as a direct result of her passing, it's surreal when I think about it.

Nannie was a beautiful woman. Not just physically but emotionally and spiritually. She was a lady through and through. But she was a spitfire - if anyone wonders where I get my temper and my stubbornness from, it's not just because I'm a Taurus, it's because of Nannie and her Italian blood. She was one of six kids born to an Italian immigrant and American woman with a bit of Indian blood in her. Two girls, four boys. Her marriage to my grandfather (Pawpaw) was hard at points but having grown up in that era, divorce was never in her mind. And they made it work.

I can remember when I was little going over to Nannie and Pawpaw's for holidays like Christmas, Thanksgiving and Easter among others. The house that they lived in that I first remember was a cozy place in a nice subdivision and behind the house were woods that, on the other side, was a farm that we could hear a rooster crow. My parents, sister and I lived about 10 minutes away so we saw them often, and actually had to drive across a creek to get to the subdivision where they lived. I'd joke that the song "Over the river and through the woods to grandmother's house we go" was true for us. Their house also had a real fireplace that sometimes they would light up for us.

Nannie would babysit for me when Shannon couldn't, and I can remember coming over when Pawpaw was home and watching the Cubs play with him. That's where I get my love of the Chicago Cubs from, my grandfather. I often say I'm a third generation Cubs fan since my mother is as well. But that's where it started, sitting on the floor by the couch where Pawpaw was, watching them play. Nannie spoiled me - when I was little I had a bad habit of eating garlic and seasoning salt. Pawpaw forbade me to have it but every once in awhile I could beg Nannie into giving me just a little. Of course, I always got caught since I'd go to kiss Pawpaw goodbye and he'd smell it on my breath.

He had a small office that I wasn't allowed to go into that was by the living room but I was fascinated by it. He had a metal desk, papers and an old fashioned table lamp that you pulled the draw string to turn it off and on. When he passed away, I actually got (and still have) a few items from the desk. There was an old oak bookshelf that had kick-knacks on a few of the shelves and books on the bottom. There were many times where I sat and read or looked at the pictures in these books. One was a children's Bible, one was a small dictionary and there were a few other, older books I can't remember.

Above all, it was a warm, loving home full of nice smells from Nannie's cooking or potpourri she had around the house. But when Pawpaw started feeling run down towards the end of 1993, they decided to move into an apartment. The apartment was fun, it was surrounded by a large creek, plenty of woods and places to explore, as well as a set of train tracks. They moved in in November '93. In February '94 Pawpaw died from a sudden heart attack. Nannie was strong even though it took a toil on her mentally and physically. During the rest of the year she attempted to keep up with the apartment but financially she wasn't able to. In early 1995 we moved to a house closer to the apartment she lived in, and it wasn't too long before she moved in with us.

We lived (and still do) in a house with a finished basement so she took the downstairs. Despite having quadruple bypass surgery in 1996, she cooked, cleaned, did the laundry and took me to school while mom and dad worked. Me and her spent a lot more time together, and now the family came to our house for holidays. These were good times.

I did drive Nannie crazy though. At the previous house, there was a playground far in the back of the subdivision I discovered at one point and spent the day playing there. I returned before dark though and I can still hear Nannie yelling, "JENNY!!!" It's ironic, I can't remember her normal voice but I can hear her saying my name in that sharp, exasperated tone heh. I didn't cause THAT much trouble!

When we got Spike in 1995, he was so little we had to bottle feed him for awhile. Nannie helped out with this and grew to love him as much as I did. He would sit in a chair next to her at the table and if she ignored him or didn't feed him as much as he would've liked, he'd lean over and nip her on the arm or wrist. She'd always swat at him but he didn't care - he ended up getting food. She never stayed mad at him for long. He was "her little devil."

Nannie loved to travel and she got to travel a lot. She went to Italy in 1997 and got to meet her father's family, along with Rome and other cities. She went with one of her brothers, Uncle Louis, and his wife, Aunt Marie. I still have the postcard she sent me. Years earlier she had also gone to Greece, and some time in the 90's (after Pawpaw died, possibly around the time she went to Italy), she went to New York City. We have a video tape of her and my Aunt Tina when they went to the top of one of the Trade Center Towers. It's eerie watching it now, seeing as both are gone and so are the Towers...

She collected a lot of nick knacks from her travels and decorated her part of the house with them. We had to actually get a separate phone line so she could keep her phone number because every call we got was for her. She had so many friends along with family - everyone absolutely loved her. Nannie was one of those women who you couldn't hate. She had a gentle, sweet nature and was so soft spoken. Nannie was a lady but thanks to her life, she had a will of steel and was ferociously protective of her family. In her last years, her sister, my Aunt Tina was diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease, and Tina's own children didn't take care of her properly. Nannie did, making dozens of trips, taking her to doctors, helping her out with bills and her apartment. It wore her out but she wasn't going to let Tina go through it alone.

In January 2001, my parents got re-married and looking back at the photos of the small ceremony that took place in our living room, Nannie looks a lot more tired than we realised at the time. I honestly have no memory of it but mom says she had started to do less around the house and rest more. One of my strongest memories is from September 11th, we had no tv in the area that mom and I worked in, so Nannie kept calling in with updates as to what was happening. I remember I got home before mom did and Nannie greeted me at the door. First thing I did was give her a long hug. We watched the news together that day and she spoke about when her and Tina had gone there.

It was six months later, in late March, that she had a seizure. I wrote about that day in my previous blog about depression, and I'll never forget the sight of Nannie in her nightgown on the carpet shaking uncontrollably. Mom had called 911 and was getting things ready while I sat with her, and I kept thinking that she was going to die in my arms. She didn't, but as it turned out, it might have been easier on her if she had. Over the course of the next few days, it was discovered that she had had cancer in her lungs that had spread via her lymph nodes into her brain. The subsequent tumor therein had caused the seizure. It was in an inoperable part of the brain as well. The doctors said that she was going to die, they just had no way of knowing when. It could be as little as a month or two or she could make it to Christmas.

Mom knew she wasn't going to make it to Christmas. Nannie opted for chemo and radiation and hoped for the best in the first few weeks. The radiation did shrink the tumor in her brain so that she had no more seizures. But both made her weaker and weaker. It got to the point where she chose not to have any further treatments even though she knew what that meant.

I learned what real love and strength was in the six weeks between her hospitalisation and her death. I learned this from the one person I'd learned the most from in my life - my mom. Debbie, her sister, didn't come over to help or give mom a break; and Shannon did a few times, but it was mom who took care of Nannie. At the start of April I started a new job, and I admit this ashamedly, but I was glad to be out of the house when Nannie started to go downhill. It was excruciatingly painful to watch, as Nannie was always one of the strongest people I'd known. To see her go from walking around to being pushed in a wheelchair; from chatting with everyone to mostly quiet; to hear her moaning for mom at all hours of the night in the intercoms we bought to hear her if she needed us; to seeing the light in her eyes slowly fade...

I watched Nannie die in those six weeks. I watched my mom grow haggard and worn out caring for her. I watched my aunt avoid coming around. I helped when and however I could, but I was scared and all too eager to avoid it. Most of my regrets with her are simply not spending enough time with her. She liked me to read to her and I did once or twice but not as much as I wish I had.

She died on Friday, May 3rd. Wednesday, May 1st, I was getting ready to go to work, and we talked. She wanted me to stay home and was sad when I said I couldn't. I can still see the frown on her face. After that, she got so weak she either couldn't talk or chose not to. Either way, her last words were to me. I took Friday off because we all sensed something. The last day most of her organs had shut down. Her skin was cold and blueish in points, her eyes were wide staring at the ceiling, her mouth open, breathing in hard gasps. It was ironic - the heart that had had to have quadruple bypass surgery on it in 1996 was the last organ to go. It kept her alive until the end. I can still remember that day. Mom and dad were eating, I was in my room sitting in my computer chair and thinking that I would get a book and go in to read to her when I heard mom go into the room and make a sound. She'd walked in just as Nannie had taken her last breath.

Her funeral was beautiful. We were all taken care of - mom had dad, Shannon had her then-husband Shawn, and I had a friend of the family Dale. Not only had all of the family come from the other states (her brothers all lived out of KY), but all her friends and even those of the family that we hadn't spoken to in years came.

There were tensions even during the viewing, however. Since then, our family has slowly drifted away or, in some cases, broken after fights. Some of the fights were about Nannie's possessions. And we discovered things that none of us had known. Some were serious. Others more light hearted - for instance, behind the books in Nannie's nightstand mom discovered 3 old cigarettes and a lighter. After her heart surgery Nannie had stopped smoking, but apparently she kept a few souvenirs.

I learned a few things from her passing. Afterwards, in conversations with family, I never hung up the phone without telling the other person, "I love you." When I would leave the house, be it to go to the store or to work or wherever, I would kiss my mom and dad goodbye and tell them that I loved them. I took to heart the fact that none of us know what will happen tomorrow or an hour from now. Our time to go may happen at any point. And if something happened to me when I left the house, I wanted my last words to be loving ones. Same with hanging up the phone. 

After awhile, my parents started doing the same, with me and with each other. Then my sister. That really warmed my heart. It's such a simple thing, but powerful. I've tried very hard since then to treat others as I want to be treated, and to have less regrets (although I've failed on that second part). I also learned from my mother patience, compassion, understanding and true love and strength from watching her care for Nannie. It is one of the most beautiful expressions of love I've ever seen.

I think of her often. She was a beautiful, loving, gracious little spitfire who taught me how to be strong, stubborn and brave. Her laughter was infectious. Nannie took opportunities when presented them and lived life to the fullest. She raised two daughters and while one remains lost, she never gave up on the other who beat her own demons and proved to be as strong willed as Nannie. My mother is very much her mother's daughter, just as I am partially the sum of those two women.

I miss you Nannie. I hope I have made, and continue to make, you proud. Ti amo, mia nonna.

Why? Because I can.

So last Friday the 27th, I dressed up and had a photo shoot before work. Then I put on something a bit more bold than I usually wear to work. I posted all the pictures on my Twitter and Facebook. To say that my co-workers were stunned is an understatement. They'd never seen me all glammed up before. They all asked, "Why? What's the occasion?"

There is none, quite simply. Friday was day 5 of "Operation Lady Gojira" and I planned this all week. Each day I've accomplished a goal or goals that put me further on my way back to being the kind of woman I want to be and further away from being the woman I was these past few months. Today, my goal was to boost my ego and prove to myself that I am a drop dead fucking gorgeous sexy bombshell. It was also to show the world that there's another side to me. 

I am a woman that can fit in watching a performance of "The Nutcracker" decked out in my best and I am a woman that can go to a wrestling show, wearing a shirt supporting one of my numerous favourites, and yell, wince and applaud until my voice gives out and my hands are numb. 

I read feminist books, Dostoevsky, Stephen King and Charlaine Harris. I watch The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, Rachel Maddow Show and Storage Wars. I stargaze and imagine other worlds out there, and I follow the news and think about the world I live in. I am a student of history and I follow politics because I firmly believe that the individual can change things. 

I am a woman, a feminist, a bitch. I am strong and fragile. I can be wild and I can be passive. Dominant and submissive. I speak my mind because I am not afraid to do so. My ancestors won the right for me to vote as well as several other things and I will defend those hard earned rights. They are mine and no politician has the right to take them away from me.


Above all, I want to be accepted and loved for who and what I am. "Warts and all," as that traitor Oliver Cromwell once said. Because if you can't handle me at my worst, then you damn sure don't deserve me at my best. This is the part of me that no one will ever take away from me, as Katy Perry put it.


What I do, I do for me. Why? Because I can.

"If you obey all of the rules, you miss all of the fun." - Katharine Hepburn

"Risk! Risk anything! Care no more for the opinions of others, for those voices. Do the hardest thing on earth for you. Act for yourself. Face the truth." - Katherine Mansfield.