GRANDMA'S STINGY AND GREAT GRANDMA'S CRAZY

I am becoming my grandmother when it comes to money and I remember saying as a kid I'd never be that tight with money, ever.   Now, I watch pennies LOL, well not QUITE that bad, but close.  To my great consternation, my bank is adding a $3 fee to the fee foreign ATMs already charge  -- and I was thinking SIX f*cking DOLLARS are you kidding me? a vision appeared of my grandmother .... that woman could tell you TO THE PENNY what she paid for a sack of flour and can of lard back in 1957 and my paternal grandmother was  not a dainty southern belle either. She was a big, tall, strapping woman, probably 5'10" in flats and she towered over us in her Sunday "pumps"... speaking of which, I am pretty sure if she earned $57.84 (the average weekly wage for women in 1957) she NEVER rounded up to 6.00 or even $5.80 in favor of the Lord in her Sunday tithe, God got His rightful $5.78.

And that flour and lard?  I can STILL hear her voice in a thick not quite South GA, not quite FL dialect

       "back, well 'hun  I b'lieve it'da been nineteen hunerd and fifty seb'n, Debbie Jean, mmm hmmm, nineteen and fifty seb'n" she'd slap her knee and continue with this strange exclamation -- never did figure out the source  "peeeee-heeeeee (yeah, that one) I paid a quarter and two pennies (holding up two fingers for added illustration), two WHOLE pennies.  Can you b'lieve that? ummmmm ummmmm ummmm."  (I can translate if necessary LOL)

Mamee was a trip. ... and STRONG?  People think Southern women are steel magnolias?  I guess some were and are but not Mamee, other than her incredibly green thumb and seriously, if she could have touched the clouds they'd have turned green , there was NOTHING flowery about her.  Large thick hands and feet, broad shoulders, wide hips MADE for bearing children, she was a ROCK, immovable in a storm and she raised her children with an iron fist (except one who came along late, VERY late in life ... he was a little older than me and the same age as my cousin, the son of their first born Inez and like most last, late children he was spoiled rotten. Again, I digress (good weed does that ... )

I am so sorry that my niece and nephews never really got to know her or my grandfather, and now my great nephews, nieces, the whole passel of them don't get to hear these wonderful stories about my grandparents (a little on both sides but heavily on my deeply damaged father's side).  The rift was so great, the family so fractured by mental illness (both diagnosed and undiagnosed) that the GOOD stories, the ones worth remembering and passing on, are all but dying.

Sure there was some shit, dirty laundry, creepy uncle stuff but there is also some rich, rich history there too.  I don't see the point in sharing far and wide, down through time, the dirt ... share it with a trusted few "family historians" and let THEM decide which generations and who to share it with ... it could be vital information in diagnosing dementia, Alzheimer's, pedophiles, heck, you never know we may one day be able to genetically manipulate violent behavior --- (God, we'll be bored to death) but seriously, a plethora of illnesses down the road.  It's high time mental came out of the closet and joined everyone else in the light ... but that's another blog/post.

Heaven forbid I or one of my kin -- the more distant the better -- goes on a shooting rampage ... we will need to blame it on someone so RIGHT NOW, this instant, if I decide to go out making a statement by doing something so completely insane as to slaughter a bunch of innocents, I'm blaming my great great grandmother ... damn I remember her but sooooo very vaguely.  She was already suffering from ??? dementia ??? when I was old enough to know who she was ... but bless her heart, I remember her being chastised because she had two different shoes on when we were getting ready for church one Sunday. I could NOT have been more than 4 or 5 years old --

AHHH, I digress --- I'M BLAMING NANA -- she died in in one of the "old school" state mental hospitals at Chattahoochee FL, which to this day has a horrid reputation for patient handling, abuse and neglect.  Truthfully, I was too young to comprehend the magnitude of what was transpiring, but I so remember the bitterly divisive arguments among the children (her grandchildren - my aunts, uncles and father, wow it just occurred to me that it was aunts and grandmother, my father and grandfather, my grandparent's youngest was my age).  I don't think that family was ever the same. My father used to say it changed him but BS, he was mean as a pit viper LONG before that. I hated him but I loved him ... I was 40 before any of it made any sense.... secrets. (another story LOL) ... but to this day I wonder what Nana had and what or how it might impact future generations ...

Aging, it's a HUGE looming scary problem for baby boomers and worse, we are now the meat in the stew, our kids are going to be asking "What are we going to do about Mom/Dad?"  (lightbulb: a blog on retirement communities)

After being accused or ranting (I am SO proud because I know if it pissed someone off someone was paying attention) I've decided to do this blogging thing again ... took me forever to find one it's been so long... now I have to figure out how to share these things.