Confessions of a Blogaholic

You are still in my thoughts. I loved both of you more than I ever could have put into words, which is a lot to say for someone who seems to have such a large vocabulary. When I'm alone, in those rare moments that I am alone, I frequently find myself thinking about you and wishing you were here. I find myself still crying over the great-grandparents Rylee will never have, the conversations we'll never have again, the dinners at Hometown that will never happen, the phone calls I'll never be able to place, the accomplishments I'll never be able to tell you about, the advice I'll never receive, the games of Jeopardy and Spin the Wheel that I'll never be able to compete against you on, the pictures that will never be taken, the smiles I'll never see. My heart still hurts when I think about all the "what used to be's" and the "what could have been's."

I miss waving at you from a few hundred yards away, waiting at your house to catch the bus in the morning, looking in the windshields of the school buses and wondering if you are driving (something I still do involuntarily), smelling the food you were cooking in your kitchen, microwaved, frozen donuts on Sunday mornings on our way to Sunday School after spending the nights on Saturdays.

It's funny...I even miss the little, tiny details about both of you--Mammaw, the way your incredibly blue eyes (that Mom, I, and Rylee ALL have!) when you were happy, the way you talked when you took your dentures out in the evenings, the house slippers you always wore, the way you said "hello" which sounded more like a "ya-ellow" when you answered the phone, how you would read Women's Day magazines in bed when we stayed over, "Oh, piddles," your neat, precise handwriting, the way the skin on your hands looked when I pulled on it during Sunday School, the mints you always had in your purse, how SLOW you ate food :) Pappaw, the way you used to smile with those 4, then 3, then 0 teeth, the glasses you always carried in your shirt pocket, how you would ask me to spell a word--the way you beat me at Jeopardy every time, the way you said "Christine" and "Hey girl!" when I walked in the door, the way you used to warn "You have to finish high school and don't get pregnant!", your potato pancakes, mixing Orange Drink and Sunny-D, mixing peanut butter and butter, when you would walk down the dead-end street and look up at the trees, the fact that you used that pocket knife for EVERYTHING (skin an animal, cut an apple, open a letter--whatever), how you called me a fish when I swam, that you couldn't keep a secret when you came to pick me up at Xavier knowing I had a car waiting at home.

You guys were more fantastic than I will ever be able to explain...And let me tell you, you would LOVE Rylee. She's funny, has a sense of humor, the funniest giggle, the brightest blue eyes. She's persistent (she'll spend 20 minutes on the floor trying to figure out how to crawl), independent. She will never know what she missed out on.

I miss you both. Love you!