My grandmother passed away last week.
She was the only grandparent I ever knew; the others were all gone by the time I was an infant. I used to wonder what I’d feel when this moment came. It ended up being relief.
The pastor at the funeral recited a fill-in-the-blanks script where the lone blank was my grandmother’s name. No one went up to share fond stories. It was so impersonal. When the pastor asked us to focus on the good memories, I couldn’t help but grin beneath my mask. I didn’t have a single happy moment to go by.
My grandmother was 59 when I was born and acted distant in my childhood. I don’t ever recall her smiling much less wanting to spend time with me. The only times I saw her was in the company of my dad.
As I got into my teens and had agency of my own, I tried to build a relationship. She was disinterested. I remember being hurt when I had spent an hour to bus to her to see her at an agreed-upon time, and for the third time she stood me up. When I’d later call, she’d say she was at the casino or grocery shopping. She never once tried to reach out.
I last spoke to her ten years ago at a family gathering. She seemed bitter and accused me of only wanting her for her money. It came out of nowhere; I had never asked anyone for money and my financial independence had been a top priority. I had gone up to her to ask her how she was. Perhaps she had the onset of dementia then, but it was in character. That was it for me, I had had enough.
My sisters had a very different relationship. My grandmother was warm to them in a way that she never was to me. They had visits and phone calls up until the end. I’ll never know why she treated me so poorly in comparison; maybe it’s because my sisters were born a decade earlier. When one of my sisters offered to take me with her last year to visit my grandmother, I declined. Part of it was that I had come out as trans seven years previous unbeknownst to my grandmother, but part of it was that I was done with being mistreated. Now that she’s dead, I have no regrets about that decision.
My lips quivered while driving with the convoy behind the hearse to the cemetery after the funeral. That brief moment would be the only sadness I ended up feeling at her death.
It was closure.