My grandmother lived with us, on and off, when I was young. Lora had some mental problems, though I never saw it. She had to go into Med State Hospital a few times for help. Her behavior caused my mom much anguish, being on the receiving end of her rantings that the FBI are coming after her.
I adored my grammy T. She would play, tirelessly, a guessing game we liked…I see something green…is it the clock?... No!...and on and on. She slept on the third floor, a twin bed set up for her. I would often, get up in the middle of the night and sneak up the stairs and crawl into bed with her. She continued work as a secretary even with her set-backs. When her alarm, which she placed clear across the room, would go off in the morning, she would bound out from under the covers, running on top of the mattress and leaping off the bed to go shut it off. She said it helped her wake up that way. I never wanted to miss her morning take off and flight! Thrilling!
She wrote children stories and poetry. Her poems are more like limericky advice and ruminations.
Whenever you find a kindred soul Never let them go. Or much happiness you will forfeit Say I told you so. Those are the words of a prophet They’re tried and true. So hold your good friends tightly. For they are good for you.
I have hundreds of them, I made a book to hold the dear poems safely. Some reflect her episodic behavior.
I once asked for asylum In this land so free. But to an insane asylum They sent me
Or
Dear little Schizophrenic With laughter and your tears It behooves us every one. To smooth out your fears
And I’ve found some endearing gems in the bunch…
The prettiest girl we’ve ever seen Is a miss who’s just fourteen. Eyes so innocent and wise Never a guilty thought did hide Skin and mouth just like a rose Why, of Jeanie, such a fuss? Just cause she belongs to us. And we love her, that we do. If you knew her, you would too.
My brother remembers coming home from school, to find Lora at the typewriter listening to loud rock and roll music, thinking to himself, That’s cool! Her children stories were accompanied by her illustrations of princesses and strange looking characters, and are really quite wonderful! She sometimes used her grandchildren as inspiration, changing our names, slightly. She also started to write a fictional novel, something my mom never allowed me to read, saying it was silliness. I finally got a chance to read it in my mother’s belongings. It turned out to be semi-autobiographical, again with the names changed. It was okay reading, at first, interesting to me because my cool grammy wrote it. The story was sexy in parts and the pages, being numbered, I found pages were missing, just as it was getting interesting. “Oh mom!” she obviously was embarrassed of those passages and removed them. As I got further into the novella, around 80 pages or so, there was delusional paranoia overtaking the lead character. It was quite an insight into what she must have been going through, in real time.