My Best Friend's Grandma

It isn't often that I have cause to pause when I'm cleaning up the kitchen, but I did yesterday. I went to grab a dish rag out of the drawer in the kitchen and the one that my fingers landed on happens to be my favorite, because it is filled with the most love. The once-vibrant blue, green, and purple yarn has faded with the chore of repeatedly wiping peanut butter off my daughter's fingers and pancake batter off our counters. The rag itself isn't perfectly square; it started out that way but that last crocheted corner is loose, as if it's creator ran out of steam, but pushed through to finish it anyway.

Actually, that's exactly what happened.

Two years ago, Scott and I were invited to join my best friend Kim's family in their Park City cabin to watch the Superbowl. When we got there, Kim's then 96-year-old Grandma was sitting in a easy chair, a blanket spread over her lap, her weathered hands keeping busy. I couldn't see what she was working on; I was too busy visiting with Kim and trying to control my almost-toddler. But, during the power outage that stopped the game, Grandma Neta finished her project and handed it to me. With love.

That is the kind of woman she was, and will forever be.

I got the text late Saturday night. "So Grandma's not doing good. Had at least 3 heart attacks yesterday. They've brought in hospice." Tears rolled down my cheeks. Kim used to tell me that I'd gotten the Allen Crying Curse by default; I was a roommate and friend that was always treated like family. It struck as I texted back and forth with my friend, and again the next day, when I held her close minutes after getting the "she's gone" phone call.

In my college writing program, it seemed almost cliche to write about losing a grandparent. We were just told not to do it. And yet, four years later, I find myself sitting here, needing to write about my best friend's grandma, her life and her death and all the moments in between.

I didn't know that Grandma Neta knew my grandfather, but when he passed away, she got ready and sat in the car in the garage until Kim's mom consented to drive her to his funeral. Perhaps she had known my grandparents as an acquaintance, but I always felt that she was there for me.

There was one Sunday in college when Grandma Neta invited Kim, our roommate Kami, and I over for lunch. Kim warned us beforehand: when her whole EFY (a scripture camp for LDS youth) group got food poisoning and she was just fine, it was more than likely the result of eating Grandma Neta's "everything but the kitchen sink and sometimes that too" Sunday dinners every week.

I remember that fateful Spring Break trip, the one that Kim and I couldn't laugh about until a year later. Grandma Neta was the biggest Aggie fan I've ever known (rivaled only, perhaps, by my mother), and when the Aggies made it to the Big Dance and were playing in San Diego, she was on her way. Two days into our first college spring break, Kim called and invited me to come with her, Grandma Neta, Grandma Neta's little brother Con and his girlfriend (now wife) Colleen to go watch the Aggies play. The trip was...well, it was as fun as any trip consisting of three senior citizens and two 18-year-old girls can be. We were unprepared for the adventure. Our constantly snacking student stomachs were no match for the one-buffet-a-day regime the rest of them were fine with. We lived on string cheese, crackers, and the delicious, life-saving, homemade candy Colleen's father had sent with us.  When the Aggies lost in the first round, we turned around the next morning and headed back to Utah. Kim and I desperately wanted to go to Tiajuana, just to say we'd been out of the country on Spring Break, but we never made it that last 15 miles. I still have a hard time eating string cheese.

Here's the thing about Grandma Neta, though. She wasn't just my pseudo Grandma. She was everyone's Grandma. She visit taught my aunt for years, even though she was well into her 90s, taking her to ball games and force-feeding her pineapple and cottage cheese and teasing her. Only days before she passed, she went to the ward Relief Society activity armed with handmade gifts for each sister (and my parent's ward, which also happens to be Grandma Neta's, is huge). There were homemade chocolates at Christmas, wash cloths for every wedding reception, and a smile and a hug and a few tears every time she saw a friend. I remember her at my wedding reception, introducing her to my babies, listening to her recite the Articles of Faith on demand during Relief Society and Sunday School whenever one was needed. She was a mother of many, a grandmother to all, and the greatest example of Christlike love I've ever met.  It is fitting that she left this life on Easter Sunday; I don't know anyone better prepared to meet her Savior.

So yes, I will write about her. Because I don't want to forget her love.