You spend a lifetime working, buying a home, raising a family, saving what you can for holidays, family vacations, and your retirement. After doing all that, looking forward to traveling, seeing the country, and enjoying your golden years what do you do when something happens that forces you to give all that up?

When I was 5 years old I started kindergarden. At the end of my first day, as we walked down the steps in front of the school we turned right instead of left. When I said “that’s the wrong way” I was told “No it’s not, I’m taking you somewhere special.” That somewhere was the sandwich shop around the corner. We went in, I climbed up on a stool at the counter and had no idea what to order because I’d never had a sandwich from anywhere other than our kitchen. My grandmother told me what kinds they had, said the tuna was the best one, and so I said “I want a tooter fish.” When the woman behind the counter asked if I wanted lettuce and tomato on it I said “No maters, they’re slimey.” I didn’t like tomatoe when I was 5. My answer to what size was “A big one. I’m a big boy now, I go to school.” I was given a small, I think my grandmother signaled not to give me a large, but that was OK because it looked big to me. It was a special treat at a special place for making through a whole 4 hours around people in a strange place without breaking down. She walked me to and from school everyday. After that she took me there every Friday after school and in the summers too.

For my birthday’s she always planned a party, invited the other kids in my class, got the house decorated and ready, and tried to give me a normal birthday. It didn’t work out. Within a half hour I was on the third floor, hiding behind the boxes of holiday decorations and winter clothing in the dark crying because there were too many people, too much noise, too much activity, just too much everything for me. Eventually she’d come upstairs to let me know she’d told everyone I got sick and their parents had come for them. When we went downstairs the presents were stacked neatly, most of the cake was gone because she’d sent it home with the other kids, and we’d sit at the kitchen table so I could blow out the candle on the piece she had waiting for me. After that I’d open my presents and after each one I’d call the kid that gave it to me to thank them and apologize for ruining the party. She stopped having those parties when I was in third grade. She also stopped making me go to birthday parties because they ended the same way, me in their bathroom in tears asking to go home. She tried to give me a normal childhood and even though it didn’t work out she always made sure I knew it was OK and I shouldn’t feel bad about not being like the other kids. My grandmother went out of her way to tell me that being different isn’t bad. She’d tell me “If everyone was the same the world wouldn’t be any fun,” and “If you were supposed to be like them they’d be just like you.”

Christmas was always special, there was always a mountain of presents under the tree, except for the ones from other family members mine were all wrapped with the same paper and they were all stacked together with the ones in different paper spread out among the rest. Too many different types of paper too close together wasn’t a good thing for me and even though it meant the tree didn’t look as picturesque the lights on the ceiling fan were on to keep the multi-colored lights and multiple ornaments on the tree from overwhelming me. She spent all year saving to make sure that even if it was lots of little stuff we’d grow up and remember huge mountains of gifts because it’s what she believed all children deserved.

When I was 8 and the first of my poems was published it was in a poetry journal she subscribed to. She’d submitted it for me. It made her cry but she still loved it and was happier than I was that it had been printed. She encouraged me to write from the time I wrote my first piece in 1st grade.

In Jr. High I went to the mall like other teenagers, but while they were sneaking out to quarry parties to get drunk and high I would be sitting in the kitchen talking to my grandmother. Marijuanna gave me migraines and I didn’t like the feeling of being drunk which was two more reasons to not go to parties besides my difficulties with social situations and environments where there was lots of noise and activity. Other teenagers best friends were the teenagers they hung out with, I hung out with my grandmother and she was my best friend. I had a few friends my age but the things that interested them didn’t hold any fascination for me so we didn’t hang out much other than at the mall and even that was going through the motions for me. I’m not gay but I wasn’t into girls, so while other guys were trying to get a girlfriend and get laid I actually wanted to just be friends and talk. That was my only interest with the girls, but they didn’t believe it so I didn’t have many friends. That was OK, my grandmother was intelligent enough that if she’d been born 40 years later she would have been a career woman with a degree or two instead of a housewife who became a factory worker during WWII so we’d talk for hours about whatever I wanted to talk about whether that was something I’d seen on Discovery channel or a book I’d just read. She had a small library filled with poetry and the classics and it’s what she taught me to read with so we had lots to talk about when it came to books. Any thoughts on how I became a published poet at eight? There’s your answer, literary teething on the works of the masters and a love of reading that came from it.

I know, I’m going back and forth about me and about my grandmother, my difficulties and her understanding. There’s a good reason for it. My grandmother raised her daughters, worked full time from the time my grandfather joined the army during WWII until she retired, paid off the mortgage, saved so she could travel when she retired, and then had to raise her grandchildren because her daughter was too busy having a good time living her life to be bothered with them. She gave up the retirement she’d worked, saved, and planned for to raise my brother and I.

She never once spoke badly about our mother in front of us because she knew children need their illusions about their parents until they’re old enough to see the truth on their own.
She never once showed any sign of resentment towards us because she didn’t feel it was a sacrifice to raise us and no matter how much she had to give up for us, to her she received far more than she gave.
She always supported us, gave us everything we needed, made sure that even though I thought of myself as broken because I understood the things that were different about me that I knew I mattered and deserved the same things as everyone else.
She dedicated herself to being a mother while still being a grandmother and made sure we had the childhood she gave her own children.

In 1995 she moved halfway across the country to live with my aunt. My issues make it impossible for me to travel, I can’t even go away on a day trip anywhere because new places are too much for me so I haven’t seen my grandmother in 19 years. Yesterday evening my aunt sent me a text message. My grandmother had passed Friday during the night. I’ll never see her again.

She was my rock for so many years. She knew all my secrets, some before I knew them. She was the one point of stability in my life and my one real connection to the world.

It will be a long time for me to process that, to come to terms with it, and with everything else that’s going wrong in my life I have to put that off as much as possible because it will be too much for me to handle. I expect there will be more posts here, some with new thoughts and memories, some repeating what I’ve already said. Some may even ramble incoherently. I don’t know how long it’ll take for me, I’ve lost family before but they were in most ways only family in name and not someone I had any real connection to.

My Nanny is gone. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to deal with this. Nanny always told me what was expected publicly and was there for me privately to help me figure it out. She was my guide through the world, my lighthouse. Now the world is dark and I’m lost and alone.

Esther Mae Ritter
September 21, 1921 to February 14, 2014