the quiet place

 This is the quiet place. 

Where there is nothing but space and air and no passage of time, where Peace and Grief battle. Peace stands, silent and patient, while Grief rages and fights and throws punches. Grief is not a fair fighter. He hits low, high, he scratches and claws. Peace waits. It is a gentle, understanding, biding of time. Grief will grow tired. His arms will fall. Then Peace will hold out his arms and the two will meet and become one until all that is left is Peace. 

This is the quiet place. 

We never want people that we love to go. We always want them, selfishly, to stay. 

Glynn Pettus. She will not be forgotten. She loved me when I felt unloved. She wrote letters to me every week when I was in college and sent me money for my ice cream fund, so that I could walk over to Hardees and get a scoop of moose tracks. She gave the best hugs. No one left her house hungry. She was sharp and smart and sarcastic. She said words like, "fanny," and "fiddlesticks." She was an expert at making people feel welcomed and wanted. Her life was layered and well lived. She shopped too much and gave too much and drove my Grandaddy a little bit crazy. Her grip on reality started to slip when he began his descent into dementia, and I want to believe that now they are together and she'll never again have to ask, "Where's Edward?"

She was beautiful, skin like a rose petal and always scented with Oil of Olay. Her hands were spotted and aged from years of dish water, cotton picking, and endless washing from hours spent in the kitchen. The best way to clean a kitchen floor was on your hands and knees and she had the most extensive collection of Precious Moments that I have ever seen. She loved beautiful things. 

The things she said, in that sweet southern drawl, "Lord have mercy!" That gentle chuckle, followed by, "Well, honey..." or, "Bless your heart." She had the gift of southern gentility, the ability to convey that you are an absolute idiot but also utterly loved. 

She was a lady. I have been called a, "nice lady." I am not a nice lady. My grandmother was the very definition of a lady. She commanded respect and carried herself with dignity and she was adored. I adored her. 

I have pieces of her, her cookbooks filled with her slanted scrawl. She was so self conscious about her handwriting, but I loved reading it. I have the cards she sent, the letters she wrote. 

I hate that she is gone, but I love that she was here. I have missed her for a long time, since she started losing herself to Alzheimer's. The cord is finally cut, and it was time. 

To those that took the time to read this, thank you. Take a moment for me, say her name, make her real.