Unlearn16: Class is in Session - The One Where I Tell You Why Grandma Ruby Was 'My Person'

00:00:00.000 Hey everybody and welcome to Unlearned 16, Classes in Session.

00:00:08.280 Guys, I don't even know what I'm going to talk about tonight because today is February 12th.

00:00:13.360 I know you guys are going to be hearing this on February 13th.

00:00:17.580 Now, why did I leave it to the last minute to record?

00:00:19.760 Because the weekend was insane, folks, absolutely insane.

00:00:22.660 My life has been a little on the crazy side, a little on the busy side.

00:00:28.260 But today, everything slowed right down because today is my grandma's birthday.

00:00:34.980 So, I got up this morning.

00:00:38.300 I didn't really think about it.

00:00:40.520 I went to school.

00:00:41.800 And as the date sort of starts coming up, I start recognizing what day it is.

00:00:46.120 and you start to have that feeling in the pit of your stomach

00:00:49.680 that ranges from sadness to anger to guilt to grief to an emptiness.

00:01:02.780 And I know I've already done a podcast about my grandmother.

00:01:05.500 For those of you who don't know, my grandma Ruby and I were very, very close.

00:01:10.040 And I'm going to tell you some stories about her tonight

00:01:12.200 in hopes of making me feel better, to be honest.

00:01:15.580 I hope you guys enjoy it. But I feel like this podcast might be my own therapy. I talk about

00:01:20.980 politics and whatever. I feel like my grandma, my dad, like whatever I need to talk, my divorce

00:01:26.300 to feel better. But so as today progressed, you just, you're sort of overwhelmed with a lot of

00:01:34.680 this stuff. And it was funny because Christmas I thought was going to be harder. But what I

00:01:40.840 remember about Christmas, missing her, not her not being here. She didn't really like Christmas.

00:01:45.500 There's so many people around her, so many things going on. My grandma liked quiet.

00:01:50.520 So her birthday, I think, made me take a big step back because on her birthday,

00:01:57.640 we would have had the food she liked. We would have spoiled her. We would have tried to buy her

00:02:03.260 something that she didn't want. We would have gone to the casino. We would have done all of

00:02:08.160 these things. And it probably would have just been me and my mom, maybe Anna, and maybe my

00:02:14.240 uncle Ray and low key, right? And that's what she would have loved. And today, sort of quietly,

00:02:22.980 I tried to remind myself of all of the beautiful things we did and who she was and what I got to

00:02:32.020 experience because nobody else, like, I don't know, but like, I don't think her other grand,

00:02:39.560 we were closer than anybody else, in my opinion. So I've had a lot of years. I mean, when I was

00:02:48.360 really little, my mom was a nurse, my parents got to, my grandma looked after me. People would think

00:02:54.060 that I was her daughter. I think she might've played it off a little bit too, right? And we

00:02:59.620 were that close. Um, I would, I, I was, when I was very young, like that's where I spent most of my

00:03:06.600 time, you know, until she started telling me things like virgins were people that weren't

00:03:12.040 married anymore. I should go to school. My grandma could be gruff. Okay. She's British.

00:03:22.160 she's gruff you didn't older grandma you'd hear more I love you's younger grandma you'd hear more 1.00

00:03:30.400 get over get out of here go on let's go like she just she just wasn't that kind of grandma

00:03:38.880 my grandma's never baked a thing I'm not a thing in her entire life my grandpa did all the cooking

00:03:48.200 all the cooking if there was bacon to be done my grandpa did it my grandma did not 0.92

00:03:52.920 my grandma um would and when i was little i remember she cook cook is such a ridiculous 0.97

00:03:59.560 word she toast make me toast with butter and marmite with the crust cut off like i i have a

00:04:05.780 like a visceral memory i'm a smell memory now marmite is strong of what that would look like

00:04:12.580 and what kind of plate it was on.

00:04:15.780 And that was when I was like, guys, like younger than four.

00:04:22.060 I remember her letting me watch action movies way too young.

00:04:27.660 And I mean like bad action, you know, all the series.

00:04:31.320 My grandma's favorite movies were like Die Hard and Lethal Weapon.

00:04:35.280 And she loved Sean Connery and she loved, you know, Action Jackson.

00:04:40.380 She loved all these movies in the 80s, and I was a bit older. I remember her singing. I remember

00:04:50.260 she had this gruff voice. My grandma always had this gruff voice, like gravelly. She should have

00:04:56.560 been like a lounge singer. Now, she did smoke incessantly, so that makes sense. But she always

00:05:02.900 would sing, but she'd always be in tune with this gravelly kind of voice. And it was funny,

00:05:09.780 because at some point the doctor found that she had polyps on her throat. They weren't anything

00:05:15.420 bad, of course, because my grandma lived to 97, smoking cigarettes, eating sugar and living off 0.91

00:05:21.180 coffee. I've never seen her. I never saw her eat a vegetable and she never, she had high blood 0.78

00:05:27.540 pressure, which I think is genetic. And that's it. Arthritis. And that's it. Lived to 97 old age.

00:05:34.680 that was it right so for all those people are like smoking kills just not her um but she had 0.93

00:05:42.840 these polyps on her throat so the doctor said listen they're but they're irritating obviously

00:05:47.540 we're gonna remove them so she went in for the surgery and when they removed them she came out

00:05:53.760 guys I wish I had video of this the more it's so funny because I have all these videos of her

00:06:00.040 later in life. This is because when I started taking video, right? And I'm just like, oh,

00:06:05.380 all those years I could have. Anyways, they removed the polyps, guys. She sounded like

00:06:09.700 Minnie Mouse. She was so angry at the sound of her voice. She would just be like, I sound 1.00

00:06:19.640 ridiculous. And it would be way up here. And it would be no gruffness. And that lasted for a few 0.92

00:06:25.600 years. And eventually they just grew back. And she says, I'm keeping them. I like my voice this

00:06:30.620 way. I am keeping them. They're not going to kill me. It's, I can breathe fine. It's a hundred

00:06:35.660 percent fine. But I remember her singing a lot. She also hasn't had an organ for, for my entire

00:06:42.520 life. I can remember her playing the organ and I have that organ in my classroom at school. Now I

00:06:47.280 have a student who's trying desperately to learn and do YouTube videos in order to fix it, which is

00:06:52.860 just beautiful. Um, so I remember her playing on that. There's not a single other person in our

00:06:58.900 family that has any musical talent, zero, none. Um, but she did love to play that organ. 1.00

00:07:07.360 Would teach all our grandkids, right? Um, I started having my first coffees with my grandma.

00:07:15.160 Listen, you do what you can do to make connections. She'd have a regular coffee.

00:07:19.300 I'd have a little bit of coffee and then milk and a boatload of sugar. But I mean, that was the time

00:07:25.000 you got to spend with her. She never got up early. My grandma, my grandma was asleep in Queen. She'd

00:07:31.460 be up till late, but she wouldn't get up before like 10, 11. That's just who she was, is the way

00:07:38.380 her body worked, the way her mind worked. When I was at university and I hadn't quite, because back

00:07:43.680 in the day, I didn't have the internet. Side note. And back in the day, I would get stuck on words.

00:07:55.920 I was never a great speller. And I get stuck on words and I know it wasn't spelt right, but I

00:08:00.520 couldn't even get close enough, heaven help me, to find it in the dictionary. So I'd pick up the

00:08:05.420 phone at midnight at 1am, which didn't happen often. And guys, I was in the night owl. I call

00:08:10.100 her. It doesn't matter. Grandma, how do you spell this? And she'd spell it. I'd be like, okay. She

00:08:15.560 goes, are you all good? I'm like, I'm good. Okay, night. That was it. Her and I never had a single

00:08:22.040 moment of pretense. You know what that's like? You know what it's like to have another person

00:08:28.040 in your life? Now, okay, wait. Some people are going to say, but you didn't tell her you were

00:08:32.920 gay until later understood understood yes there was that that was a big thing but what i mean is

00:08:40.880 there was never there was always an authenticity

00:08:44.000 there was always an authenticity to our time together if we wanted to watch tv we watch tv

00:08:54.220 if we wanted to make something to eat she'd make me something to eat she'd ask me to do this i'd

00:08:58.580 asked her to do that. If I wanted to go buy shopping, she'd come out and go shopping.

00:09:03.640 There wasn't a moment where we felt I could sit in the most comfortable of silences with that woman 0.85

00:09:11.200 or talk about nothing or play Scrabble. She wasn't a big board game fan, guys. She hated games,

00:09:20.780 actually. We used to try to make her play games at Christmas and stuff, and she'd always get so

00:09:25.660 bad because she'd lose. She's such a bad loser. This one time we tried to play hum zingers 0.99

00:09:31.420 game where you get the name of the song and you have to hum it every house to guess it.

00:09:38.880 I wish I'd film it. I wish I filmed all of it because we're so bad. It was really hard

00:09:45.140 because nobody in our family could sing. Now, grandma could sing, but she didn't know how to 0.99

00:09:49.500 hum. He didn't know how to hum. I don't know what. So she'd do this. La, la, la. Elvis Presley.

00:09:57.460 What? And then we'd laugh and it would be hilarious that she'd think we were laughing

00:10:02.000 at her that she didn't want to play anymore. My grandma always left the house dressed to 0.99

00:10:08.920 the nines. She always looked great. Always jewelry on point, hair done. She smelt like 0.90

00:10:17.280 Nivea. You guys know what that cream, that Nivea cream smells like? I can't get past it. I should

00:10:23.320 just get some so I can smell it. Because that memory has the greatest receptor.

00:10:33.020 She was proud. Really, really, really proud. And I think sometimes that pride got in the way of

00:10:43.240 her saying how she felt. And I wish there could have been more moments where, a long

00:10:54.940 time ago, where she could have just said what she felt and if she was scared or if she was

00:10:59.560 sad or if she was nervous or anxious. You know, we have a whole culture now where everybody

00:11:06.540 has anxiety. Everybody talks about it. I think my grandma had ulcers. I think she battled

00:11:11.220 internally forever. I know a lot of people did it for forever, but in retrospect, I just wish

00:11:19.020 she talked about it more so that I knew her more. One of her favorite movies was My Fair Lady.

00:11:27.580 I learned, we watched that movie together so many times. I know every single line in every single

00:11:34.780 song. I remember she'd sit on her bed and crochet. Guys, we have so much crocheted. If anybody wants

00:11:40.020 a bedspread. She'd sit on her bed and crochet and it wasn't ever to do, nobody wanted the 1.00

00:11:47.940 crocheted thing. You know, nobody wants, it doesn't matter. That was the thing that gave

00:11:54.040 my grandma purpose in that moment. So she had something to do externally to just whatever

00:12:01.140 else, watching TV or watching movies. We used to, when I was young, we, me, my mom, my grandma,

00:12:10.280 my grandpa, my two uncles were going to university at the time, but we all, all lived in. And my mom,

00:12:15.480 my grandparents owned this 120 year old general store with this giant house on top of it.

00:12:22.700 So for a few years, we all lived together. Now running a business with your, with your family,

00:12:28.840 I guess for my Bob, wasn't the best, easiest thing in the world. My mom, my grandma always

00:12:33.500 got along really well. My mom, my grandpa were very similar. So they fought a lot. They both

00:12:38.600 thought that they knew how to run the business and yada, yada, yada. But my mom, my grandma,

00:12:44.500 my grandma was so proud that she ran. She was the postmaster. She talks about that. She talked about

00:12:49.440 that until she was 97. She also did in England, I think. She talked about that she was in the

00:12:58.180 in England, which is like a, you know, women that who, who served, she never really gave a story.

00:13:05.640 I never really got a story. You know, I, I, as, as a person of my age now, it's like,

00:13:12.040 you want to know all those little caveats and stories and pieces. And when I was 20 and stupid, 0.99

00:13:17.820 I just didn't ask, just wasted it. You know, I drove to Florida with my mom and my grandma, 0.99

00:13:25.920 probably 16 times. Do you know how long that drive is when we stop every five minutes to go

00:13:30.880 to the bathroom for my grandma to, you know, get out and have a cigarette? I lie. My mom and grandma

00:13:36.740 used to smoke all the way down there. But nonetheless, my mom would go to the bathroom 1.00

00:13:40.260 every five seconds. We'd get out and shop. It would take us five days to drive down there. 1.00

00:13:44.940 My mom also, we'd drive to Memphis because my mom said it was on the way. For those who know

00:13:50.420 geography. It was a blatant lie. And I'd spend all my money by Syracuse. And my grandma gets so mad

00:14:00.120 because she'd know that it's not like my money's all spent, but now she knows that my mom and my

00:14:06.360 grandma are going to have to give me money for anything else I want. We'd have a fight just after

00:14:15.260 Syracuse, my mom and my grandma, because there used to be these triptychs where you, where again,

00:14:21.540 pre-internet, you go to CAA and they'd give you a map, but the map would be like a portion of the

00:14:26.980 map on every piece of paper. Then you could then flip like a giant notebook. And so my grandma's

00:14:32.620 job was to be the navigator. You got my, my grandma, I sometimes think, well, I know my

00:14:38.500 grandma is a very, very smart woman. And I sometimes think not having a career

00:14:43.120 didn't make her feel less because she was proud, but I feel like my grandma was very smart,

00:14:51.520 very capable. And sometimes I feel like not having a career limited who she could conceive herself to

00:14:59.540 be and what kind of things she could have accomplished. I'm not in any way demeaning

00:15:05.900 what she chose to do and all of that. I just mean, she wanted to, her whole life, I feel like

00:15:14.800 she wanted to have control, power, and some degree of authority, not to be mean with it,

00:15:23.100 but to feel filled by it, to have a purpose for it. So my mom would give her the triptych, okay?

00:15:30.360 My grandma would tell her where to go.

00:15:31.780 Now, sometimes it gets confusing.

00:15:35.100 My mom would get lost.

00:15:37.240 And when my mom would get lost, my mom would get mad at my grandma for not telling her to turn the right way.

00:15:41.900 My grandma said, I told you to turn the right way.

00:15:44.100 And my mom says, well, let me see the thing.

00:15:46.340 And my grandma says, I'm doing the navigating.

00:15:48.400 My mom says, yeah, but you missed the thing.

00:15:50.180 And then once every trip, my grandma would pitch it across the car and say, you do it.

00:15:59.740 every trip. If we went 16 years, guys, that happened 16 times in exactly the same order

00:16:08.020 that I just described. You know, my grandma, grandpa got sick. My grandma just took care of

00:16:15.960 him. I don't remember her ever complaining ever. Not one time. She just did it. You know,

00:16:22.660 He passed when I was like 25, 25 maybe, and 25, I think in 2000.

00:16:33.660 And my grandma was by herself.

00:16:37.680 So it was around that time that I got my first job,

00:16:42.220 and my mom decided to move up with my grandma and stay with her

00:16:46.100 because my grandma didn't want to move out of her house, 1.00

00:16:47.940 so she didn't want to move to my mom's house.

00:16:50.140 So that was a thing. 0.63

00:16:51.040 but my mom didn't want her to be alone and my mom was alone. Um, and so, you know, they moved

00:16:58.820 in together. So I felt like they were taken care of. So I could kind of have this little beginning

00:17:02.600 of my life where I didn't feel like anybody really needed to make. My mom was good, taking

00:17:07.400 care of my grandma. She was still working. Everybody was good. You can kind of hunker down.

00:17:11.240 And I think about that time and how I went up and saw her. I talked to my grandma almost every day,

00:17:18.180 but I feel like I missed out.

00:17:23.520 We could have done more trips.

00:17:27.460 We could have done more things together.

00:17:30.060 So I could have got to know her even better as I was getting older.

00:17:34.540 And this idea that I just had so many more important things to do

00:17:38.240 and I just talked to her on the phone was just, 1.00

00:17:41.720 you look back at it now and you're like, what an idiot. 1.00

00:17:45.280 What an absolute moron I was. 1.00

00:17:48.180 so when i convinced her to move down here because you know my mom couldn't keep driving 0.99

00:17:56.540 from berry to thing and they moved down here and um i remember she was at that point she

00:18:04.700 wouldn't smoke in the house anymore and um they were renting this house

00:18:08.460 and uh my grandpa grandma was smoking in the garage and she fell my mom called me and said

00:18:16.840 you have to come over and i lived we lived a block away and i came over and i had to

00:18:24.840 pull her from these like she was in the sort of laundry room and i remember holding her

00:18:32.840 and she wasn't really crying but she kind of she kind of lied into my shoulder

00:18:41.560 she'd broken her arm by the way her humorous clean through clean through 0.63

00:18:46.840 And she just leaned into me and said, well, don't go anywhere.

00:18:52.400 And the ambulance came and we went and she got fixed up.

00:18:55.720 And I mean, she heals like, when I say she heals like Wolverine, I'm not, there's no exaggeration there.

00:19:02.220 She's the woman up until 97 healed like Wolverine.

00:19:06.820 but that moment of her lying there with her head into me and we're sitting on the the laundry room

00:19:17.440 floor is the only time I've ever felt like I could take the first time maybe I was I was taking care

00:19:25.680 of her and I think we got closer I think but I think grandma also doesn't want to she never

00:19:34.960 wanted to feel like people had to take care of her, just that they wanted to. And I, I honestly

00:19:41.660 believe that that was the best proof of our relationship because I was always, my grandma

00:19:54.100 always let me take care of her because never for a single second did she think that I didn't want

00:20:03.100 to, or need to, or, or did I, was I not doing that out of love? Not out of obligation.

00:20:13.720 Never once did I do something with my grandma out of obligation. And so I think I was one of the few

00:20:20.800 people, my mom, listen, my mom took care of my grandma forever. I don't want to minimize that

00:20:26.440 in the least, but they were a mother, mother and daughters have different relationships.

00:20:30.000 and and they were well-suited best friends but for me I think she let me take care of her

00:20:40.560 and and then I and then I would do the same and you guys know how my grandma takes care of me

00:20:47.280 get my purse right you don't say no to that and I don't mean it like you should take it

00:20:53.340 I should take advantage it means like if grandma wants to buy dinner let her buy dinner because

00:20:59.460 it gives her that's her love language that's how she takes care that's how she feels like there's

00:21:05.700 there's this thing right it's not just me taking care of her like she can still take care right

00:21:12.580 and we'd have these talks it's i mean guys sometimes it's so hard because eventually

00:21:18.900 she moved into my house built a basement apartment for her and my mom so i could help take care of

00:21:24.020 them. And this was, oh, I don't know, 10 years ago now. And every day, every day, guys, it didn't

00:21:37.480 matter if I came home at 2 p.m., if I came home at work, at dinnertime after work, if I went out

00:21:44.980 and I came home at 1. I kid you not. My grandma was sitting out on my porch chair, and I still

00:21:51.560 have those chairs. I don't think I can ever throw them away. Having a cigarette. And by the way,

00:21:57.060 it could be 110 degrees or minus 130. She was still out there. She was still like, if it was

00:22:02.740 hot, fine. She'd say it's lovely, right? If it was cold and windy, she had her hood up. She was like

00:22:07.860 crumpled down into this tiny little ball. Smoking. Talking about the birds. Talking about 0.66

00:22:15.720 the neighbors, talking about what goes on on the street. It was just so nice

00:22:24.180 to be able to come home every day, walk by her, talk to her, do you need anything,

00:22:33.180 live in the same space for her to know that I'd do anything she ever needed me to.

00:22:38.660 and i never ever would begrudge or feel any negativity towards any of that

00:22:51.040 and it left this beautiful softness to our relationship

00:22:56.620 that i just don't i don't know if she experienced with anybody else

00:23:04.180 so do i feel grateful for that of course i do

00:23:08.520 Do I feel this pit in my stomach of missing that?

00:23:14.560 Of course I do.

00:23:17.400 And I don't know if that's it.

00:23:19.400 There was this weird comfort and consistency for so long.

00:23:26.760 Well, I'm almost 50.

00:23:28.100 For 50 years, I could count on that person being my person.

00:23:43.840 And his first birthday.

00:23:49.260 now i know okay she was 97 what was i expecting her to live to be 150 i told her 100 in all

00:23:59.880 fairness i said you can you you like hit 100 i think that's reasonable

00:24:04.380 and she got sick and she had to be taken care of full time because she couldn't get up anymore and

00:24:12.420 i felt all this guilt about not being able to do that because i was working and my mom was sick at

00:24:18.240 the same time on a nightmare um but i saw her at that place and i've talked about this before

00:24:25.540 it's a it was a beautiful beautiful place for her because my grandma felt and you could tell

00:24:31.160 instinctually that the men and women that were there took care of her with the same kind of

00:24:37.760 maybe not love but some love to be honest but that same kind of giving nature where

00:24:45.160 there was no begrudging it. It wasn't an issue. There was just human connection and empathy and

00:24:54.840 caring. And my grandma knew that. So she got to feel that by more people, not just me.

00:25:05.720 And she'd forget things, right? She'd forget. I mean, probably earlier than that, when she was

00:25:15.020 even living here like she would start forgetting you know who people were whatever she forgot me

00:25:21.700 one time like I went there every day but she forgot me one time for about 10 minutes guys I

00:25:28.280 mean I didn't try to like convince her of anything I didn't I I think I did everything I was supposed

00:25:34.240 to do just to make her feel good but I don't think I've ever had a punch to the stomach like that

00:25:39.060 before. That was hard. But that was only one time. You know, I don't know what the purpose of this

00:25:54.320 was, other than for me to be able to voice all of this stuff with you guys. You know, I know that

00:26:03.100 finding people in your world, and sometimes they're blood relatives and sometimes they're

00:26:09.780 not, but finding people in your world that you can be authentic, that you can sit in silence,

00:26:21.680 that you genuinely want in your space because they just belong.

00:26:28.000 That's family

00:26:31.460 And I'm lucky enough to have that with my mom

00:26:34.200 I'm lucky enough to have that with my uncle

00:26:35.940 I'm lucky enough to have that with Anna and Rebecca

00:26:39.260 I have those people

00:26:41.180 But the connection we had

00:26:45.080 I think was built over so many years

00:26:51.080 And it was such a stable force

00:26:54.920 How could I not but feel again

00:26:58.000 gaping vacancy with her not being here you know i go to casinos because i feel like

00:27:07.440 she'd want me to you know and uh i buy outfits my grandma always liked seeing me in outfits

00:27:16.080 it didn't matter what kind by the way she always liked seeing me in different outfits

00:27:20.800 she loved my school pictures there were certain things where it was just

00:27:28.000 It was the things in which we connected on consistently and laughed about.

00:27:35.980 My grandma had this really, really great cartoon giggle.

00:27:41.740 That's why, for those who are watching, I got Gus Gus right here.

00:27:47.420 It says, get my purse.

00:27:50.380 And Gus Gus is a, you know, the Cinderella, Cinderella. 0.98

00:27:54.600 And the way he kind of laughed, I feel like was always my grandma, but the fact that that laugh came out of such a gruff, British, put-together, don't-let-her-emotions-get-the-best-of-her kind of woman, I think it just made my day. 0.95

00:28:14.680 Well, it did make my day. 1.00

00:28:15.780 so on this february 12th 2023 i want to say a very simple happy birthday grandma

00:28:29.080 i hope you can hear me you can feel me and i hope you had a great day wherever you are

00:28:38.720 don't worry I still got your purse

00:28:42.300 have a good one guys

00:28:44.740 I'll see you next Tuesday

00:28:46.040 same bat time

00:28:48.220 same bat station

00:28:49.340 goodnight

00:28:50.740 dismissed

Unlearn16: Class is in Session - February 13, 2024

The One Where I Tell You Why Grandma Ruby Was 'My Person'

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