2024-11-28

My father's mother died today (2024-11-28). Content will come some other time. Heh, programmers. We seem to pretty much agree that it's better she isn't in pain anymore. I want to write a eulogy. I don't know if I'll present it at the funeral, but I think that will be my way of grieving. I've never written one before. I suppose I could look for tips, but I'd rather be original and quirky.

I remember once that when I was a small child, I saw her using the upstairs toilet. I think she also watched me or my brother play soccer. Most of my memories relating to her, though, are of visiting her and her husband's house in Wingo, Kentucky…

• She used to give gifts to me and my brother when we visited. They were usually simple plastic toys or money—though I remember that she once gave me a little orange camera with games on it (probably one of these).

  At some point my mother told me that it was actually her picking out the gifts. I appreciate it anyway.

• My father and I once found two baby red-eared sliders (which are turtles, not small hamburgers) in a pond near her house. We took them home, named them Tuck and Wingo after the place we found them in, and kept them as pets for a while. We fed them worms, played with them on occasion, and gave them heat from a lamp.

  That same lamp burned a hole in our carpet on accident. Oops. Also, it is illegal to own a turtle and to release one into the wild in both Tennessee and Kentucky, and doing so might damage the native population. I'm not an ecology-know-abouter but I literally just looked that up to write this and now I'm worried that we might have actually caused the notable lack of animals there lately. Oops.

• My mother and I were wandering in that same field behind the house and were a bit lost, but we found our way back to the street. To our surprise, three dogs came running at us from the house on the other side, barking. She was scared, but I didn't notice because I was already on my way to pet the dogs.

  

  The most magical thing of all, though, was when one of the dogs sniffed us and promptly led us back to the house! What incredibly sweet dogs.

…and I have more memories I could talk about. They're wonderful, but they're not about her. The thing I regret most in this moment is not spending more time with her. It's cliché for a reason.

You know how, in video games, you can walk up to a character and press A, and they'll tell you something mildly interesting? You can actually do that in real life, too, and in this case, I realized that too late. I look forward to hearing about her from others and learning about her from her possessions. Speaking of possessions, I remember that she loved turtles. She had an entire shelf just covered mostly with various turtle figurines.

Someone told me that she used to like to draw. I didn't even know that for most of my life! I don't often find people who share interests with me IRL. I gave her pictures sometimes. That's my go-to when I don't know what to write in cards.

She clearly did care about me a lot. She loved to get phone calls from me and asking me about my life, even if she did get confused about it in later years… My parents and brother visited her recently. My mother told me that my father's mother saw her with her glasses on and hair back and thought she was me, and that she didn't correct her. I thanked her.

To the rest of my family, I hope you are well, especially her husband who my father is currently visiting.

annnd neocities push --prune .