Category: Letters to Gramma

Letter #7: Your Voice

On By Alicia McCauleyIn Letters to Gramma2 Comments

Dear Gramma,

Today I woke up in the small morning hours and wandered out to the living room.  The house was cool and dark and I tapped away on my computer, writing in the stillness.  All the windows were open and the croaking frogs were the perfect metronome to my words.  When I was done, I crept back into bed as Terry was getting ready for work.  I drifted off to sleep for one last precious hour.

In that snippet of morning sleep, I dreamed that our family was having a party.  It was a backyard party with crisp white tablecloths snapping in the breeze.  Aunt Nancy poured some sort of exotic soup into bright white ramekins.  She filled one too full, and soup dribbled over the edge, seeping into the tablecloth like a tea stain.

My mom and I set the tables and I stopped for just a moment to watch Terry.  He sat near the grass and looked so handsome.  He didn’t see me sneak a peek.  You always told me he just gets better and better looking with age and I couldn’t agree more.

You arrived at the party and came up from behind me, putting your arm around my waist.  I put my arm around your shoulder and kissed your cheek.  It was so soft, like the cheek of a baby.  You said “Hi, honey.”  Your voice was so clear.  In my waking hours I have trouble recalling the particular lilt of your voice, the rhythm of Texas buried under years of California.  But in my dream your voice was so familiar, so filled with love.

In my dream you had cancer, but it appeared you were undergoing treatment.  I asked you “How are you feeling?”  You squeezed my waist and said “Much better.  How are you feeling?”  I laughed and said “I’m feeling fine, Gramma, just fine.”  You said “That’s good.” and patted my bottom twice, like you always did.  I have no idea why you always patted my bottom like that.  Was it because I’m so tall and you were so small?  Is that all you could reach?

There was music in the background and Uncle Jon and Aunt Jill danced close together on the patio.  Hayley was mortified until Katie pulled her on the dance floor.  Katie wore a gorgeous, dark pink dress that made her rosy cheeks even more striking.  Katie and Hayley danced and laughed.  Everyone laughed with them.  You and I stood there, your arm still around my waist, my arm draped around your shoulder.  You leaned into me, just the slightest little bit until your hair was touching my chest.  We watched them dance and we were so happy.

You turned to me and asked “Is everyone here?”  Before I could answer, I woke with a start back in my own bed.  I gasped for air like I was breaking through the water’s surface after swimming down deep.

My dream hung around me like gauzy sheets and as I sat up in bed, I realized my alarm hadn’t gone off.  I swung my legs over the edge and for a second my mind convinced me that my dream was real, that your cancer was responding to treatments.  That you were indeed feeling better.  That you were still here.  My feet touched the carpet and I realized it was not real, that it was just a dream.  A cruel dream that left tear drops on my shirt as I got dressed.  The dream looped in my mind, always stopping when you asked “Is everyone here?”.

In the unforgiving light of day, I answered your question.  Everyone is not here.  And today that thought has seeped into me, leaving me stained with sadness.

I love you, Gramma.  Come talk to me in my dreams again soon.

Love,

Alicia

Letter #6: Postcards From You

On By Alicia McCauleyIn Letters to Gramma4 Comments

Dear Gramma,

Last night I was enjoying the quiet of the wee morning hours.  I could hear Terry snoring in the bed as I sifted through a box of things my mom gave me.  There was a book of things I wrote in first grade that I can’t wait to share with my class.  There were cards from my first few birthdays.  I traced your signature on the cards you sent me and I traced Grandpa’s name, too.

Underneath the stack of birthday cards were items my mom brought back from your house, including the postcards you bought on our trip.  The backs of the postcards were blank and I sat in our office staring at their stark backs.  Tears welled in my eyes because those postcards will always be blank.  I sunk to the floor, wishing for your words to trace with my fingers.

I flipped the postcards over and ran my fingers across each glossy image of the places we’d been together.  It occurred to me that it was exactly three years ago to the day that you took me on that crazy bus tour for my birthday.  We had such a good time, didn’t we?  As I studied the postcards, I remembered the day we visited Novi Sad.  Do you remember when we stopped on that bridge and I asked you to take a picture of me with the beautiful buildings in the background?

You took this:

I asked if maybe you could take another picture.  One that captured the buildings and especially the clock tower in the background.

You lined the camera up carefully and took this:

I laughed and asked if you could possibly take another photo with the buildings in the background and preferably my entire head.

For a third time you lined the camera up really carefully and clicked the button, confident that you’d certainly got a good shot that time.  Do you remember how hard we laughed when we saw this?

And then our bus was leaving so we never did get a decent shot of that clock tower.  Gramma, you were so good at so many things, but you were an awful photographer.  Just awful.  And I’m so glad because each time I think of that bridge in Novi Sad, I remember how hard we laughed that day and how relieved you were when I banned you from taking photos for the rest of our trip.

Later that night, we ordered banana splits for dinner in the hotel bar.  The bar was closing and you asked the waiter to take our picture.  We ate and talked well into the wee hours of the morning.

Thank you for taking me on that trip.  And thank you for never sending those postcards to your friends.  Three years later they have come back to me, reminding me that the things we saw on our trip paled in comparison to the time we spent together.

Love,

Alicia

Letter #5: Signs

On By Alicia McCauleyIn Letters to Gramma1 Comment

Dear Gramma,

Another cycling season has come to a close and I thought of you often as I rode up hills and coasted through the plains.  I rode through places so beautiful, I thought my heart was going to burst from all that splendor.  You were always interested in the world around you and I wanted to share some of my favorite memories of the places I’ve seen from my two wheels.  I wish I could show you in person.  Sometimes Heaven feels so far away, such a long way off.

On Easter Sunday I rode with Uncle Jon.  We rode behind the hills you loved so much and came upon this cactus farm.


Pete completed his first century in May and here we are with the three Shastas: Shasta Lake, Shasta Dam and Mt. Shasta.  We had so much fun together and I wanted to call you so badly that night.

This one is from the finish line in Portland.  Do you remember my childhood best friend, Julie?  She cheered me on at the finish line.

And let’s face it, I will never, ever race in the Tour de France.  However, the LiveStrong Chalkbot is rolling out messages of inspiration all along the course.  This one is from my friend, Lynn.  Yes, I know how lucky I am to have such thoughtful friends.

The world is a wonderful place and I wish we were traveling it together.  But for now it is enough that I carried your sign in my jersey pocket and carried your spirit in my heart.  I love you, Gramma.

Love,

Alicia

Letter #4: Dreaming of Whales

On By Alicia McCauleyIn Letters to GrammaLeave a comment

Dear Gramma,

Last week we visited the beach.  Not our beach, but still the tang of the salt air made me miss you desperately.  I walked the beach in the mornings, forcing myself out of bed to the yawning mouth of the ocean.  I walked alone with my thoughts.  My heart pounded with the surf.

On the third morning, after an hour with the ocean, I returned to the house and peeled off my shoes and socks.  My foot was covered in blood.  My sock was soaked through.  Even my shoe was filled with blood, so filled that blood had seeped out of the top of my shoe.  The sight of all this blood scared and confused me because I wasn’t hurt.  Unbeknownst to me, I’d punctured my toe and it leaked and leaked while I left footsteps in the sand.  In the shower I watched the hot water swirl all that blood down the drain.  I sat under the streams of water and cried, but not for my toe.  I cried for all the bags of blood that could not save you.  I cried for all the times I walk the beach without you.

The night after we returned from the beach I had the most beautiful dream.  In my dream I was crossing the Sundial Bridge, but it arched over an ocean inlet, not a river.  As I crossed over, hundreds of whales swam in the water that rose just inches underneath the bridge.  There were too many species of whales for me to count and they ranged from babies I could have held in my arms to long mothers snaking in the water beneath me.  I remember humpbacks arching in the water, revealing their twin blowholes.  They twisted and danced in the water, lobtailing on the surface of the water.  They slapped their flukes up onto the bridge, leaving their foamy fingerprints for me to walk on.  The water shimmered and bubbled in the presence of all those whales and in my dream I was delighted to witness such a gathering.  I hurried to tell my friend, who was not yet to the bridge, but when my foot hit the pavement, I awoke in the cradle of my bed.  I shut my eyes and tried to return to my dream, tried to return to the whales, but only sleep availed itself to me.

The next day, I couldn’t stop thinking about the dream and the thing I couldn’t let go of was that the only sound in my dream was the water lapping at the bank.  The whales were silent, not making a sound when they fanned their huge tails on the bridge right in from of me, not singing a single note as they frolicked around me. Male humpbacks are the singers of the species and so I choose to think that the whales in my dream were females.  Mothers and daughters, aunts and nieces, grandmothers and granddaughters, happy in the good company of each other.

The average heart of a humpback weighs 430 pounds and has 4 distinct chambers.  I can’t imagine a heart that large in size, but what I can tell you is that in my dream, my heart was coursing with blood and when I woke up each chamber of my heart was filled with joy.

I hope I dream of the whales again.  And I hope that when I do, you’ll be walking beside me.

Love,

Alicia

Letter #3: Happy Birthday, Gramma!

On By Alicia McCauleyIn Letters to Gramma1 Comment

Dear Gramma,

Tomorrow would have been your birthday.  I had a dream of your birthday or maybe it was a memory of your last birthday.  I saw you blowing out the candles and laughing.  If only it were that easy to wish you back.  I’m afraid I’m going to forget your laugh, your scent, the particular bend of your fingers.

In the hospital, you were so sure you’d be home for your birthday.  I remember my eyes welling, threatening to spill over onto your bed.  I didn’t know how to tell you I didn’t think you’d be going home again.  Instead I swallowed the lump in my throat and kissed your hand, telling you I hoped you’d be home for your birthday, too.

And you are home.  Home among hosts of angels and saints.  Home with Grandpa.  Home with your mother who gets to be with you on your birthday for the first time in stacks of decades.

Yesterday I was deleting numbers from my phone.  Numbers no longer in service.  Numbers of friends who have faded into people I once knew.  I came to your number, my finger hovering above the red delete button.  I couldn’t press the button.  Silly, I know, but I couldn’t.

I’d like to call and wish you happy birthday tomorrow.  I’d tell you about riding my bike with Pete and how proud I was when he crossed the finish line.  I’d tell you how well Terry is doing.  You’d no doubt tell me that he just gets better and better looking.  I’d agree, smiling at your love for him.  I’d tell you crazy stories from this wild year of teaching and we’d laugh.

But tomorrow my finger will just hover over your phone number.  Tomorrow I will cry and plumb my memories for happy times, like when I sat on your lap on our trip together, my arms and legs sticking out all over.  You said I was never too big to sit on your lap.  Not to point out the obvious, Gramma, but I was too big, way too big for your small lap.  But I didn’t care.  And neither did you.  You always had room for me and for that I’m grateful.

Happy birthday, Gramma.  I wish we were celebrating together.  I miss you terribly and I love you.  I love you so much.

Love,

Alicia