“What children need most are the essentials that grandparents provide in abundance. They give unconditional love, kindness, patience, humor, comfort, lessons in life. And, most importantly, cookies.”
-Rudolph Giuliani

I hear a sweetly delicate and subtle voice through the window screen of the kitchen. As I put yet another flame tinted ladybug into a translucent Mason jar, the voice asks me what I want to eat for lunch. ‘The voice’ knows just as well as I do the words that are about to pass through my mouth. Ten minutes later inside, just like any other day, a thin Styrofoam plate covered in slightly less than a handle full of raisins, 3 saltine crackers, and half a piece of sliced pickled bologna awaits me on a high-rising bar centered in the middle of the kitchen. ‘The voice,’ my grandma whom I call Nana, comes in carrying an opaque cup filled to the brim with grape Kool-Aid to accompany my plate of food. As a young girl, I convinced myself that going over to my Grandma’s house was my own school-for-one. Every morning I would be greeted with a cheerful, “Hello Allie-Gushent!” or “Good morning Alexandra Grey!” My grandma is and probably always will be one of the few people who recognises me and acknowledges me by either of those two names. Now, being more mature and less naïve, I realize her home was just a place for me to stay where my parents knew I was secure and safe while they were away at work during the weekdays. After my mother would pick me up, I would tell her all I learned at, ‘school,’ although most of it was made-up and my day primarily consisted of swinging outside, playing games on Barbie.com and also playing Pokémon on my Gameboy sp.

In the earliest of mornings I could find her putting the finishing stiches into, yet another, handmade quilt. I can almost still see her almond shaped eyes looking at me through her wiry glasses, with wisps of hair falling out of a barrette she has used to hold back her choppy brown locks. Surrounding her are baskets full of anything from a new roll of fabric we went and bought at Paul’s Discount, to pairs upon pairs of battered and decrepit jeans that began to rise above our ankles as the years passed on and we, (my brothers, sister, and I) grew. Her hands have grown unsteady from an inconvenient duo of arthritis and a lifetime’s worth of what she is doing now, sewing. She sits in the same chair that has been here for what must be years, while she scrutinizes the texture, feel, and size of the cloth she is about to affix with the others. The blanket she is crafting will soon be mine. It will keep all the others she has made for me company, folded fastidiously and handily at the end of my bed. Every time I got a new quilt, I would always feel treasured and cared for. The fact that my grandma would spend so much of her time and effort on something like this for me, would always give me a warm, fuzzy feeling that cannot be easily created.

Of course, this is how our relationship was, what seems like ages ago. A combination of me maturing and being able to care for myself, and her having to tend to my grandpa who fell victim to stoke, have led to not seeing each other as often as back then, but still frequently. Early in the summer mornings I still hear a familiar, “toot toot,” of her milky-white Honda to alert me that my ride for volleyball practice awaits me in the driveway. The aroma of vanilla radiates from the pine-tree shaped air freshener that dangles from her rear-view mirror, and shakes as the engine rumbles and vibrates down the road. On so many occasions, this noise has been affiliated with so many other things. Anything from: a day of shopping with her, a ride to the waterpark, a way to get to the movies, and after school extra-curricular activities. A few days out of the week, when we are at her house, I still know I can find the string cheese in the bottom left drawer of her aged, cream-colored refrigerator, and knock-off brand Oreo cookies in the large bucket on the top shelf of the pantry.
I have continuously found it astounding, how spending a lot time with one person or spending a lot of time at their home can create such a peaceful atmosphere, and comforting sense of familiarity. If I’m ever having an off-day, coming to her house is just the soothing aura I need to get back on track. Sometimes when I walk in, waves of my past, all of my memories and recollections wash over me and remind me of a much simpler time. A time when I was only low-spirited if my crayons broke or my gray and white cat Charles scratched me. When all of the innocent childhood memories are in my mind as I walk out the door, I feel a sense of enlightenment. It reminds me that maybe life isn’t as complicated as I think, and my Nana is a huge part of reminding me of that even if she does it unknowingly. Because of her, I’ve been taught that sometimes the best lessons in life are the ones that people don’t mean to bestow upon you, but will always have a mark on your past, on your present, and on your future.