I Am Who I Am

A piece written some time ago which says a lot about who I am. It is appropriately entitled: I Am Who I Am


My granddaughter called me “eccentric.”
Well, actually she called me her “weird Gramma,”
but we reframed it
so the world wouldn’t think us so strange.
What she said I love
because I’m the gramma who’d try anything once.
Twice, if it didn’t hurt!

I spent a lot of my life “fitting in,”
so when I decided it was OK
to “fit out,”
I really spread my wings.
And what she was was a grammy
like none other,
the one who had skipped through Disney World,
arm in arm with my daughter,
singing ”We’re off to see the wizard,”
just because.
I’m the grammy whose fingers
are tipped with metallic purple
and toes with bright orange,
and has forty other colors at home.
And the one who wears a hat a wide as an umbrella
on a trip to the zoo
because the sun is just too damn hot,
regardless of the stares.
I’m the grammy who bought
glue-on flowers and butterflies
for the little girls to wear on their fingers,
and who dons big flower earrings,
bright yellow and orange
or the ones with multicolored fish,
and has 30 colors of lipstick.
I’m the grammy who likes what she likes
and doesn’t care much about who doesn’t.
Another granddaughter knows this grammy
is the one who loves daisies
and anything purple
and going on “dates” to the theater
and who sits on the ground
if that’s what it takes to see eye to eye.
Never mind that I can’t get back up!

Let other adults go through life with decorum,
doing things by the book.
I’ll take my life any day with its spontaneity,
the weirdness,
the joy and the fun.
I’ll be the eccentric grammy
in purple shoes and a floppy hat
how makes bouquets of the dandelions,
gifts from the little girls at my feet,
and who does all the silly things
just because I can.
I’ll skip as long as my knees hold out
and enjoy my grandchildren
and wave my purple flag of proud eccentricity,
weaving daisies in my hair.

~


Ya know . . . I think being weird is kinda wonderful.



Beautiful Brooke, for whom I was the weird gramma (when she was about 7), is the one in the dark shirt. She is nearly 17 now. The others are: standing, son-in-law Kirk; seated, left, daughter Terri; center, grandson Philip; granddaughter Aleksis.