My Grandma Nadine turns 90 tomorrow. To even comprehend living for another 71 years is too much to handle for me. How many experiences, how many people, how many days fill those years. We threw her a party to celebrate her 90th Birthday and 80 people showed up. Old friends, new friends, children, grandchildren, great grandchildren, nieces, nephews, cousins, nurses, co-workers. All of these people were people that she had impacted at some point or another in her life and they all made their way out to Fresno, CA on their labor day weekend just to celebrate her. When my dad asked me if I wanted to say something, I wasn't sure I did. How could I put all that I felt about Grandma and all the stories into one thirty second speech? She's meant a lot to me, that Grandma Nadine. So what story was I to tell? I couldn't pick one, all that I felt I could share was about love. The love that she had for everyone in her life from the beginning until now.
I remember that she was always looking out for me and my siblings growing up, making sure that we were good and spoiled, like every grandma does. There were always chocolate bunnies sent at Easter and chocolate Santas sent at Christmas. There was always a white dish on her coffee table filled with peanut m&ms. She sent money for school clothes and birthday gifts. She always brought a suitcase full of cinnamon bread when she flew to Seattle and we would eat grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner and toast for breakfast. This was her language of love. But as she has grown much older, that love language hasn't stayed entirely the same. Now, it is her turn to receive love. All her life, she has been caring for each person around her, whether by giving them a meal or a ride to church, she has constantly put others before herself.
She has faced hardship after hardship, yet she never let it bring her down. I went through old photo albums and saw love and joy in each one of those photographs. She was living a life full of fun and friends, just like I am having right now, but she had no idea the years that would follow. The loss of a child, a sister, her parents, her husband, another child and another sister. How, in the face of so much loss, can a woman remain so strong? Her love of Christ remained strong, even when His love seemed gone. It is amazing to me that, after all she faced, she still managed to touch so many lives and love so much. It is so easy to harden your heart when life turns in a downward direction, but she moved forward and she continued strong. That is a lesson to be learned from Grandma Nadine. And I will take advice from a 90 year old, they have seen more than I could ever imagine.
It was beautiful to see how appreciative everyone was of her. My siblings and I went through all of her cards with her and read them aloud to her. She knew each and every one of those people so well and when they said "Thanks for all the fun memories" she would start listing off those memories. These are real relationships and it makes me wonder who I will still be friends with when I reach an older age. Are we putting the time and effort into our relationships to make them last? I sure hope so, but if we're not, we should start. If we want to know the love and faith and joy that Grandma Nadine knows, we need to stop taking for granted all that we have. We need to learn to live in a deep love that is only found through Christ.
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