Tuesday, March 25, 2008

• Edit: Just added a pic.
  
  

  I'm supposed to write something for my grandmother's service and read it... and I wanted it to be non traditional, because really, she wasn't traditional at all.   Film noir style, for a noir woman.

  Hey Grandma...

  I thought long and hard about what I wanted to say to you, and about you.  How to tell your story "how I sees it," grandma.  I wrote a ton of things through this strange dark cloud of a time, even long before the final kiss goodbye.

  And it's funny, because now that I'm here, with the opportunity to tell all these fine folks about you, I don't know where to begin, grandma, because like so many things in this funny, funny, messed up world, the beginning is frustratingly at the end.  Things like this are always backwards, seems like.  They feel that way, anyhow, don't they?

  And the truth is, grandma, you were all backwards too, maybe a little more than the rest of us, but in the end, just like the rest of us, no better or worse.  Damaged goods is what we all are, and some get banged up more than others.  Somewhere along the way, you got lost in the dark like we all do, and it got you good.  But we all know that part, grandma, and really, it ain't so important right now.

  The part they don't know about though, is how you were the best underground card player around. 

  How we'd get together in the blue carpet lounge over a double shot of moojuice and Dad's, and go fish until the late hours of the evening, when the stiffs came round to pick me up in their funky landboat of an oldsmobile after school.  Oh yeah, I remember how those glossy red finger nails'd pluck that ace from your hand, and how you'd lay that fateful card down on that antique pine table with a mischievous glimmer behind your glasses.  I remember that plume of smoke rising from your curled lips, and how you'd grin at me knowingly for a few silent moments, before purring in heavily accented French: "I put my ass on the table". 

  I knew you weren't THAT French, but you said it like that anyway, because like that ace, you were a card, Grandma.  And come to think of it, maybe that's why I didn't do so good with homework... but you and I both know that there are a ton of important things you can't learn in school, like how to play good cards or how to laugh at stuff that didn't come from a fancy television box or math book.

  And those are the things about you these squares aren't supposed to know, 'cause between you and me, grandma,  it's easier not to remember those things sometimes, especially right now, if you know what I mean.  It's kinda funny not to look back at your window from that oldsmobile ride home, and see you waving your fancy fingers from your window anymore. 

  But I know that's what you were thinking too, the last time I saw you, and that's why you waved back.  Different room, different game, and definitely no antique pine table in that hospital room, but life's funny like that, ain't it.  You still gotta play with the cards you're dealt, and you did, grandma, you did.  You were the best card player around.

  Anyway, I'm gonna keep the rest of our secrets between you and I for now... but even at a time like this, in this messed up world where ends come too soon and people get lost and banged up, I want you to know I won't forget.  And you know what... Maybe we all got it backwards too, and this ain't the end at all...in fact, yeah... this world is funny like that, and I know that somewhere up there, you're still grinning back at me over a shot of moojuice, with an ace up your sleeve.

  Right back at ya, grandma.

   

   

  • 6:55 PM
  • 245 views
  • 34 eprops
  • 23 comments