Grandma Patti

Grandma Patti sent me a letter the other day. She wrote about things that have troubled her lately, about a grief group she's been attending, about the long-ago death of her first child. She said she always wished she had a diary to help her work through this stuff but wasn't comfortable leaving her thoughts laying around for anyone to see. I keep thinking about that. She's 86 and she's talking about something she's always wanted and still doesn't have. This easy thing. This reachable, achievable want. It's got me thinking about the wants in my life. The difficult versus the easy and how silly it is, really, to not satisfy the wants that are accessible to us. I want to travel. I want to be fluent in French. I want my sugar skull frosting to be neither too thick nor too runny. I want to swim in the ocean more often. I want to be more accepting of, and less angry with, annoying people who annoy me. I want to write every day. I want to matter.


It wasn't as easy as I thought it would be to find Grandma a diary with a lock - which I determined would take care of her diary worries (although I still can't for the life of me think of what she wouldn't want people to know. In fact, I think it's high time you spill your guts, Grandma) Anyway, it turns out that most diaries with locks are intended for children. Imagine that! I just couldn't see Grandma rocking something like this:

 or this:

I finally found her a beautiful and elegant silver diary with a fabric cover and metallic gilded edges. It's gorgeous.

I hope she likes it. I hope she writes down her wants and wishes for herself and sets about to at least achieve the likely and the possible. I hope that for us all.