Burial expenses for Gramma

I'm not good with asking for help. I'm especially not good with asking for help for the woman who raised me to be proud. To take lemons and make lemonade. But the fact is, we need help. And we need help for her.

Somewhere, she's cringing right now. Sorry, Gramma.

On Wednesday, November 23rd, my gramma, my other mother, the woman who was my steady safe haven, slipped away. After a life of fighting, of struggling, of taking nothing and turning it into something, and living when even doctors said she wouldn't, she fell asleep and woke up on the other side.

There's so many memories racing through my head as I type this. I want you to know my gramma like I know her. But how do you fit 31 years into this space? I could tell you that she was more than a grandmother. She was my other mother and helped raise me and my sister. I could tell you about all the times I crept into her room after having a nightmare. The times I sat on the side of her tub and talked about my papa after he passed. I could tell you about all the nights I sneaked into her room during a storm with my pillow and blanket and held her hand through the worst of it. How her prayers were my lullaby. I could tell you about how she cooked dinner every night and griped at me when I wouldn't eat it, told me I'd learn to like it, all while making me another meal. I could tell you about our Talks. How we'd shut the door and the world away, so it was just the two of us. And in that safe space she created, she'd hold my hand and we were free to say anything without judgement. I could tell you about the times she stayed up waiting for me after she moved out into her own house, had leftovers in the microwave and clean sheets on the bed in the spare room and pretended like I wasn't drunk as a skunk. I could tell you about her dressing up as a pirate for my fifth grade Halloween party, complete with a convincing beard and how I didn't recognize her for long minutes, sitting there in the corner, watching me close with a smirk on her face. I could tell you about how she was there for both of my childrens' births, riding cramped in a backseat for 27 hours for the youngest one, just so she could hold him when he was brand baby new. I could tell you her stories from before I was born. How she dressed up in a gorilla suit and terrorized a neighborhood. Or the time she got pissed at my papa and threw a turkey over their apartment balcony. How her mother died from TB and her dad abandoned her and her sisters when she was six and they bounced from house to house with nothing. Working their fingers to the bone for threadbare skirts. But she kept going. She kept surviving. She built a life and a family and she taught her daughter and her daughter's daughters how to love unconditionally .

I could tell you about how it's always been the four of us. Me, my mom, my sister, and my gramma. Through thick and thin, as the world shifted and changed around us, it was always us. How we were her everything, our babies were her babies, and she was our rock. Our fiesty, took no crap, unwavering rock.

I could tell you I could tell you I could tell you.

She made arrangements for this moment, when the earth still spun but she was no longer on it. A plot next to my papa. Her name engraved in a headstone, just waiting to add a date after the dash. But she didn't forsee the extra expenses. She didn't foresee moving away or her life insurance policies to be cashed in by a cousin. She made arrangements for us, to make it easier. But death is expensive and we have to get her from Manistee County to Washtenaw County.

And we need help.

I feel horrible asking, but my stepdad, who held her as she passed, is stressed and grieving and my mama, who's been her caregiver for 7 years, is a wreck and the 5k they were quoted is much more than anyone has.

So I'm asking for help with a wince. A cringe like my gramma would give. Anything you can spare is appreciated. I'm sorry to ask for it, with holidays breathing down our necks and presents to buy, but I gotta get my gramma next to my papa. After a life of giving me so much, being my old broad who was steady and sure and usually had a funny quip and a hand for me to hold during storms, I gotta give her this anyway I can.

I gotta try to make lemonade.

Any and all money raised will go directly burial expenses (and gofundme fees.)

Thank you. For reading this far. For all the kind words. For everything. Your support during this time, as we try to find our footing in this new normal without our pillar, is deeply appreciated.