I've had trouble trying to put my thoughts into words.
My Great Aunt Mae died on Saturday, May 10, 2014, and I've not mentioned it publicly until now. Why? Because words simply cannot express my emotions, they cannot comfort her family, and because I really don't know what to say.
She wasn't my Great Aunt Mae because she was my grandmother's sister, she was Great because she was filled with nothing but love. People like her are so very rare. She always had a twinkle in her eye; she laughed with gusto; and she took care of people without hesitation.
When I was 12, I, along with my brother and sister, was spending the summer in Wyoming with my father. I forget exactly why, but my father and I had a huge falling out and I refused to speak to him. I mean, seriously. I would not utter a word to him. We had two weeks left in our visit and then we would be delivered to my Great Aunt Mae and Uncle Ed's home San Diego, CA, to meet up with my mom and grandparents who were coming in from Mississippi for a vacation.
After a week of my refusal to speak to him, my father relented and took me to my Great Aunt Mae's a week early. If I recall correctly, I flew there on an air plane and my Great Aunt Mae (GAM) and Uncle Ed (GUE) picked me up from the airport.
What followed was one of the best weeks of my entire life. EVER. It was wonderful because I didn't have to share the attention of my GAM and GUE with my brother and sister. I don't know if my GAM knew how special that alone time was for me, but it was.
My GAM worked at the mall. At Sears. At the CANDY COUNTER!!!!
She took me to work with her one day and I got to go all over the mall and window shop AND I got to eat candy from her candy counter! I recall seeing a pair of canvas Nikes. Lavender. When my mom and mammaw came into town, I took them to the mall and showed then the shoes. It was the only souvenir I wanted. I got them.
Each night during this week with my GAM and GUE, my GAM made me a banana split. Yes, every night. Oh, it was my own little slice of heaven. I was 12 and eating ice cream, no, not just ice cream, I was eating full fledged banana splits (without my brother and sister) every stinking night.
Honestly, that's all I recall of the actual events during my week with my GAM and my GUE. And that's not really what made it so perfect.
What I really recall is the feeling of being welcomed. I wasn't made to feel in the way, or as an intruder into their daily lives. It just seemed like the most normal things for them to be taking in a 12 year old a week early and with all but no notice.
That feeling has stayed with me forever. The details of how my GAM passed are not important here. What is important is what she left behind. Of course, she left behind friends and family; a husband, her children, and grandchildren. But she also left behind a 12 year old girl who was mad at the world until her GAM fixed everything in that moment in that little girl's world.
I hadn't seem my GAM in years. But I know she loved me and she knows I loved her; and that makes everything a-ok in my world.