#10 Grandma - Olivia

While I was home this summer, I took my sister to college and spent a couple nights at my grandparents' place.  

My mother brought up this blog and tried to explain it to my grandparents, and that scenario makes perfect blog fodder by itself.  

Imagine, my mother speaking slightly louder in a completely unconscious northern Ohio accent to my grandpa, trying to explain the internet.

"A blog is like a massive news letter that anyone can read on the internet, Dad." 

"On that computer?" my grandpa asks, looking from my mother to my grandmother for confirmation.

"Yep.  Don and Olivia post about different things every week.  Anyone can read it." 

To which my grandma supplied, without a lick of hesitation, "Well I have a topic for you - you ever tried Queen Anne's lace jelly?"

I could not craft a better summation of my grandmother if I tried.

Except perhaps that one Mexican restaurant incident.  I may have to save that for another day.

When I think of my grandmother, I think of parties.  I have definitely been to more parties at my grandmother's house than any other location, including my own house, the houses of friends, and all the public schools I have attended combined.  Every holiday is an easy excuse for food and neighbors and family and whoever is dating who.   More chairs can be found, more mashed potatoes can be made, the fridge is always stocked with every imagined variety of canned beverage, and there is more talk spilling from every spot in the house than you could hope to take in.

Every Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Fourth of July, with so many birthdays and other family functions in between for the lengths of my whole short life.

And people wonder why I am the way I am.

I've heard it said that all women turn into their mothers.  Maybe some don't.  But it's more than a mere possibility for me.  It is an eventuality.  I know this because I see my mother slowly filling the roles my grandma once kept.  Which means I'm probably going to have to step into hers soon.

Which is fine.  My mother and Grandma Pat are both shining lights of goodness and I hope to reflect a fraction of that.  But I also very much hope to be a little like my Grandma Martha too.

If my mom's mother is mashed potatoes, than my dad's mother is scalloped potatoes.

Let it be known that I love both of my grandmothers to the roots.  But if Grandma Pat cooks to feed the whole neighborhood, and it might take a while, then Grandma Martha cooked to feed the brood, and if you missed it, that was on you.

My Grandma Martha had panache.  No, more than that.  She was panache.

I remember the process of buying school clothes for probably 1st, maybe 2nd grade.  The nineties were not a boon time for children's fashion.  Adoption was not yet trendy.  Now figure the oddly shaped body of a growing kid who is probably fighting genetics and the indulgence of Schwann man deliveries.

I would try something on in some forgettable half-price retail venue in Parkersburg, WV, not particularly caring about any of the specifics of what I was trying on.  

But when I walked out, Grandma would say "Oh girl!  You look sexy!"

I would run back in the mirror to see if something had changed since I put it on.  I mean, how could I doubt that?

As far as I knew, I was sexy at age 7.  Cat shirts, stirrup pants, chubby cheeks and all.

I hope to inspire that someday.

From what I gather, being a grandparent is awesome.  You're an automatic fave and you've figured everything out that matters.

Maybe that's why my mother has hinted at grandchildren already.  She's ready for parenting retirement.

I hate to break it to you Mom, but you've got a while to go before that torch is passed if you want them from me.  You may have to be satisfied with grand-cats from Ellie.

But then again, who knows?  Adoption is so hot right now.

Don Replies:


I know the "Mexican Restaurant" incident, and I think it showed some restraint in not telling it.  I guess that's a big part of what we're doing here: weighing the good stories against what we might need to keep private.  Sometimes the pressure of wanting to write something really interesting flies in the face of maintaining our family's privacy.  


One thing for certain, however, is that no matter how they sometimes made/make us laugh (or cry), we've both had some awesome women to show us how to go through the good times and the bad times while keeping our heads up.  Your Grandma Martha would be so proud to know the woman you've become (and as long as you keep the restaurant story to yourself, I'm sure your Grandma Pat will feel the same way.)  The story I'm saving, by the way, is the complete retelling of time when I was 10 and your Grandma Martha gave me one of the finest beatings of my life for squirting some disappearing ink on her freshly-washed laundry.  The ad from the novelty store on the back of the comic made it look like such a great idea, but by the time the ink turned clear, the bruises on my behind had showed up.  Go figure.


See ya here on Sunday for some "Alien" talk.  I don't want to get the readers too excited but I'm going to go ahead and let it slip here that we've both been to Rosewell.  Nannu Nannu.

#10 "Grandma" -- Don

Grandma Dudding

As with most people, I suppose, I had two grandmothers, and when I was a child, my brothers and I referred to my mother’s mother as “Little Grandma” and my father’s mother as “Big Grandma.”  Both grandmas lived within a half hour of each other; “Little Grandma,” Evelyn Stowe, lived in Syracuse, Ohio, and “Big Grandma,” Marie Dudding, lived in Middleport.  Thus, while my parents moved every few years around different parts of Ohio (my dad was a high school football coach and throughout my childhood where we lived was a bit dependent on whether his teams had winning seasons or not), my grandmas always stayed in the same place, and Meigs County felt like home long before my parents ever got around to moving us there.

This morning as I write this piece, I am conscious of how my memories of my grandmas are filtered through how I experienced life as a child and how I now see these memories as an adult.  I have a few vivid memories of things my grandmas said and did that at the time had little significance for me as a boy but, now, completely define the relationships we had to one another.

Although I don’t think I was overly aware of it as a child, as I look back on it now, I’m pretty sure Grandma Stowe didn’t care for my brothers and me.  I remember my mother taking us to visit her mother and Mom told us to play outside while she went in first.  I remember hearing through the screen door Grandma Stowe saying to my mother, “I suppose you had to bring those boys with you” as if my brothers and I were pets that my mother ought to have boarded somewhere whenever she came for a visit. 

About a quarter mile from Grandma Stowe’s house was a small dairy bar, and I remember how during the summer Grandma used to give us a dime, each, to go get an ice cream cone and then afterward we would go play on the playground equipment at a nearby elementary school.  Of course, when you’re seven years old, nothing is more exciting than the prospect of a sweet vanilla cone followed by the exuberant freedom of the slides, swings, teeter totters, merry-go-round, and monkey bars that were the staple of all playgrounds of my youth.  It never really dawned on me back then that 30 cents was the price Grandma Stowe was willing to pay to get us out of her hair for a few hours.  Today, we live in a completely different world, and it’s hard to imagine that parents used to send seven year old children off on their own to play unsupervised for four or five hours at a time.

And, naturally, being unsupervised, we did get hurt from time to time.  Once as toddler at Grandma Stowe’s house, I got into my uncle’s tackle box and put a fishhook through my lip (I still have the scar inside my mouth today).  Another time, my brothers shoved me into the enormous muddy hole of a basement that had been dug for a house that was under construction, and not only did I hurt my leg, but I took a beating for it when we got to Grandma’s for getting so dirty (in my brothers’ defense, I did provoke them into it by daring them to shove me into the gigantic muddy hole).  The worst injury I ever got a Grandma Stowe’s place was when I was five and my cousin locked me into the upstairs of Grandma’s garage.  My cousins and brothers were content to leave me locked in the second story of what had been my late grandpa’s workshop, but when they told me they were going for ice cream, I couldn’t take it so I tied a thick hemp rope to a rafter and tried sliding out the window.  By the time I reached the ground, I didn’t have any skin left on the inside of my hands, and I spent the rest of the day crying with my hands held up to an electric fan to help relieve the torment of the burning.  I don’t remember exactly what Grandma said about my injuries, but it was something to the effect that that’s what happens to little boys who play where they don’t belong.

Later, perhaps by the time my brothers and I were in our late teens, Grandma Stowe had learned to say an occasional nice thing to us, and while I would never describe our relationship as “warm and fuzzy” she did seem to have true affection for my own children when we went to visit her in the last years of her life.  It’s possible since I had two daughters that Grandma Stowe had a soft spot in her heart for little girls that she didn’t have for little boys.

“Big Grandma,” on the other hand, always seemed glad to see us even if she had a difficult time keeping our names straight. Since my dad had seven siblings, Grandma Dudding had a slew of grandchildren to keep track of, and since we didn’t visit that often, Grandma Dudding would just simplify the process of trying to identify me by calling me “Twin.”  This used to bother me a lot as a kid because my twin brother, Dan, and I looked so little alike that I could not see how anyone could get us mixed up, but at least, when Grandma Dudding called me “Twin” there was nothing intentionally mean about it.

Grandma Dudding was a hugger and being a rather larger woman (although late in life she lost a lot of weight, during my early childhood there was good reason to refer to her as “Big Grandma”), I remember when she hugged us we seemed to practically disappear inside her massive arms.

Grandma Dudding had a tremendous sense of humor and even though I didn’t always understand the funny things she said, I adored her laugh.  My memories of Grandma Dudding include how she always seemed to be involved in some strange arts and craft project such as knitting covers for pop bottles that she would attach a doll’s head to.  Even as a very young child I would wonder who would want a doll with thinly disguised pop bottle for a body.  Around Christmas time, Grandma would attach wings to her pop bottle babies and transform them into angels.  At Easter, Grandma Dudding made “bunny cakes” by baking two round cake layers and cutting one of them into ears and a bowtie.

The funniest thing I can remember Grandma Dudding saying (and it’s pretty typical of the things that used to fall out of her mouth) was “I’m looking to get married again.  You wouldn’t know any rich old men who happen to have one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel, would you?”

Throughout my teenage years, I remember Grandma Duding (who never had much, she was always as poor as a church mouse) would give all of her grandchildren underarm deodorant for Christmas presents.  It was both a practical “one-size-fits-all” type of gift and oddly comical at the same time.  After all these years, I can still hear Grandma saying, “Well, if you all end up stinking, then at least no one can blame me; it’s the best I can do for you folks.”  And you know, as we all blunder through life sometimes succeeding, sometimes failing miserably, I think that’s all we really want from our family: “the best I can do for you folks.”

Olivia says:


I do have fond memories of Great-grandma Stowe.  I remember her living room was completely open to her bedroom and that she had some pretty cool old toys.  I'm fairly certain those where days when Ellie and I wore many a matching outfit.  


I do wish I could've met Great-grandma Dudding though.  I think someone once told me that I did when I was very small?  I don't know.  I certainly don't remember.  But I think I would've liked her a lot.

#9 Sterotypes - Olivia

As unfair as it may seem, I categorize people according to their shoes.  

They're not a terrible item for deduction.  

For one, everyone needs them to get service at most establishments.  Probably to prevent an epidemic of foot fungus or to keep them warm when you're in the frozen food aisle.  Also to increase the likelihood of keeping your toes, which are actually pretty necessary in balance, I've heard. 

Plus, they're a safe investment.  You're going to use them daily.  You can genuinely think about their worth in terms of mileage or function.  

Then there is, of course, the aesthetic aspect.  Shoes are the bass players of your ensemble.  They say a lot about your look while maybe not saying the most.  They do their own thing.

You may only notice them in elevators, but somedays, it's all I can take in about a person.   It makes deciphering a person a touch easier.  Crazy, am I? 

You do it too, whether you realize it or not.  

There are general assumptions made about the barefooted.  And perhaps we associate things those in steel-toed boots.  What about those who own a pair of bowling shoes?  Or only wear flip-flops?  Or wears of Chuck Taylors? 

I cannot deny the sentiment I feel about wearers of Crocs.  

We project status on Cinderella when suddenly she can dance in glass heels.  

Somes the clues are helpful.  It helps us filter.  

I am a moccasin wearer these days.  I got them at thrift store.  They don't off the support of, say, my last thrift store pair of Keds, but they're comfortable.  And I like the beading - I said it.  

Don replies:

I've never thought of judging people by their feet, but what you say makes a lot sense.  If we're going to put people into categories, why not start from the ground up?  The nice thing about sorting people by their footwear is that clearly people make their own choices as to how they want to display (or conceal) their feet so at any time, they can move from one clique to another merely by slipping on a new pair of kicks.  I really want to make a pun about the dangers of judging people's soles, but I'm afraid you'll put your foot down and I'll end up looking like a heel.  Okay, enough for now, let's meet back here next week; I'm sure we're both going to have a lot to say on the topic of "Grandma."

#9 "Stereotypes" -- Don

Near the end of the 18^th century a French printer by the name of Firmin Didot began mass-producing prints with metal plates he referred to as stereotypes.  The prints that came from this process became known as clichés with the term arising from the clicking sound the prints made as the rolled through the press.  Thus, long before we started using these words to refer to people or expressions we now find tired, stale, and hackneyed, these two words emerged from our human consciousness out of the impulse to create standard, identical duplicates. 

The types half of stereotypes comes from the ancient Greek word that referred to the dents that show up when you bang one thing into another while trying to make its impression; the stereo comes from the Greek word for “stable,” thus a stereotype is pretty much something that makes a stable impression.

Today, of course, when we talk about stereotypes we’re referring to the common cultural assumptions we make about others who we identify as belonging to a particular subculture (which could be generated by a broad spectrum of identity characteristics including ethnic, religious, sexually-determined, class-based, age-related, regional, or ability-based markers).  As is with pretty much everything else in the universe, whether stereotypes are detrimental or beneficial depends upon both our reason for noticing these cultural markers in the first place and then, subsequently, what we do with these social pointers once we’ve become aware of them.

Psychologically, stereotypes can help us organize how we cognitively map our everyday realities, and they can help us navigate the complexities we face in having to deal with the nearly 7 billion unique carbon units we recognize as other people.  Having a sense of how others fit into our vast mental landscapes can be beneficial to both them and us if we use what we recognize as stereotypical about others as channels for demonstrating respect and understanding. This is to say that when we use what we recognize about others as opportunities to appreciate them as individuals, to accept what is different about them without worrying about having our own cultural orientations being somehow maligned or infected, then our attempts to classify others in order to respect them is both healthy and positive for us both.

On the other hand, when we use those cultural identity markers we recognize in others as a means to degrade or dehumanize others, there is probably nothing more toxic to the psyches of all involved.  Self-mutilation is perhaps the most indicative sign of psychosis, and as horrible as the scars of self-inflicted damage may be on the surface of our skins, what we do to our insides by being hateful is even worse.  Whenever we dehumanize others by reducing them to objects, we end up maiming our very souls.

If, despite the multitude of ways we can find to designate our differences from each other, we wanted to boil down the essence of our common humanity it must certainly be this: we need each other to survive.  Not a single one of us is capable of making it through this life without relying upon others for our physical, emotional, and spiritual sustenance. Like it or not, we are dependent upon one another to survive and thrive.  The beauty of human existence, however, is that while I absolutely need the rest of you to make it here, I can nonetheless follow my own path as long as I don’t stand in your way while I do it.  This is to say that we can all go our own way without necessarily getting in each other’s way while we do it.

Trying to understand other people’s cultural beliefs and traditions does nothing to negate my own; in other words, I lose nothing by being respectful to the ideas or customs of others that I don’t subscribe to.  What Christianity refers to as “The Golden Rule,” (Treat others as you, yourself, would wish to be treated) is also known as “The Ethic of Reciprocity”), and it is, as far as I know, the essential lesson of all authentic religious and spiritual traditions that have emerged throughout human history since the dawn of civilization.  I find it amazing – despite its comprehensive ubiquitousness and its utter timelessness – how frequently this universal concept gets subordinated to our local desires for superiority and power. 

The only way we can mistreat others is to blind ourselves to our mutual responsibility for each other.  In order to hurt others, we must act as though they are not as fully human as we are and, thus, somehow, they are not as deserving of life’s endless satisfactions as we believe we are.  This attitude, as far as I’m concerned, is nothing less than a form of cosmic self-injury and ultimately, the innermost meaning of sacrilege in that demeaning others denies the essence of God that lives within all of us.

We can only really take our own humanity seriously when we finally learn to fully take responsibility for accepting the humanity of everyone else.  It seems to me where people often go wrong (and being human, I’m including myself here) is that we want to take “The Golden Rule” and water it down: instead of feeling obligated to treat others the way we want to be treated, we only feel it’s necessary to respond to others in the same way we are treated by them.  But notice how that’s a complete misreading of The Rule:  the commandment is not to respond to others in-kind, but to treat others (regardless of how they are behaving) in the manner we want to be treated by them.  In other words, to truly live according to the tenets of The Golden Rule, we must model the behavior we want from others even when (perhaps especially when) we are not receiving the treatment we would like from them.

I know.  I know.  It’s hard.  Perhaps it requires a level of sainthood that most of us can only aspire to.  But, it is something we can aspire to while we’re tripping and stumbling along our way.  Treating others the way we want to be treated (rather than the way we perceive we are being treated) is the North on our moral compass, and while each of us are free to follow our own paths, the ability to respect the others we meet who are also on their own journeys is the only way we are ever going to find the paths that will ultimately lead us home.

Olivia says:


Wait, so I always thought the "Golden Rule" was don't eat anything you find on the ground?  


Jokes! 


But seriously, you make so many valid points.  What scares me is that there are so many people who would profit from those words.  


I'm so grateful that I was raised in such a way that I was taught to love everyone around me.  It really makes things better, I have discovered.   Thanks for that.  


Now that we've agreed that making judgements based on limitations is wrong, let's talk about our relatives!