My Guiding Light

This blog really heated up for me as a vehicle of venting and expressing my trials and tribulations with my children when I “retired.” Since re-entering the workforce, I have yet to blog. I have meant to blog, I have thought about blogging. However, I have not found the time which translates to priority to blog since I have taken on this new challenge. As irony would have it, I am currently looking down the barrel of a gun…ok figuratively but I am at the crossroads of a life altering situation and I immediately retreat to my blog. Maybe not so ironic after all.

I have had three extremely strong pillars that have been the foundation of my upbringing. Mine were more unusual than most. Mine were my mother, my grandfather and my grandmother. I have blogged in the past of my intensely close relationship with all three. And not to minimize my relationship with my two other pillars, I’m focusing on my relationship with my grandmother.

My grandmother has been many things for me but most of all – my guiding light. At times I resented her for it. The bar she had set for me was so high, such little wiggle room that I felt I was often set up for failure. The interesting part was that I never failed. I always did what she wanted for me. I led my life almost exactly as she would have chosen for me. How could she have been wrong in wanting the best for me?! Fortunately, as I matured and understood what motivated her tall expectations for me, I grew to appreciate this.

Some people you cross paths with you find you have things in common. And maybe when people are integral in your upbringing that becomes even more likely. My grandma and I have always been two peas in a pod. Never-ending desire of hitting up the Nordstrom anniversary sale and all things Nordstrom, love for cooking and baking, obsession over cleanliness and organization, appreciation for thank you notes, the self given responsibility of staying in touch with those you love, an unnatural relationship with perfection. The list goes on and on. As much as I would cringe when my mother would declare that I am my grandmother’s grandchild, I grew to celebrate it.

My guiding light is fading. I have been blessed enough to have my grandmother for 36.5 years of my life. She has had the opportunity to meet and enjoy my children. She has played ball with Drew, she has attended Gabby’s countless shows and she has spent countless hours gushing about our bonus baby – Noah. Most people aren’t as lucky as I have been. Yet I feel like the most unlucky person in the world.

The times of having those never-ending conversations with my grandma where we analyze and discuss everything are over. I will no longer be able to share my successes as well as my failures with her and therefore my successes will never be as sweet ever again. Every holiday in my life has a theme of Nana, how will I celebrate another holiday without her? When I have a cooking or baking question, as easy as it may be to google the question – it was always easier to just call her, but I can’t do that anymore. The deficit in my life is going to be, already is, so large.

As this new chapter of my life is quickly approaching, I’m gaining a new understanding for the circle of life. Her thoughts and values run so deep in me – in everything I do and everything I say. As much as I am devastated at the thought of living in a world where she is not ever present, I realize that she instilled her guiding light in me. And soon that will have to be enough.