I went straight up to my room. My thoughts kept constantly turning to the last days of my grandmother's illness, to her sufferings which I relived, intensifying them even more: when we think we are merely recreating the grief and pain of a beloved person, our pity exaggerates them; but perhaps it is our pity that speaks true, more than the suffers' own consciousness of their pain, they being blind to that tragedy of their existence which pity sees and deplores. But my pity would have transcended my grandmother's sufferings in a renewed outpouring had I known then what I did not know until long afterwards, that on the eve of her death, in a moment of consciousness and after making sure that I was not in the room, she had taken Mamma's hand, and, after pressing her fevered lips to it, had said: "Good-bye, my child, good-bye for ever." And this may also perhaps have been the memory upon which my mother never ceased to gaze so fixedly. Then sweeter memories returned to me. She was my grandmother and I was her grandson. Her facial expressions seemed written in a language intended for me alone; she was everything in my life, other people existed merely in relation to her, to the opinion she would express to me about them. But no, our relations were too fleeting to have been anything but accidental. She no longer knew me, I should never see her again. We had not been created solely for one another; she was a stranger to me.
Marcel Proust, Cities of the Plain, pp. 802-803
I don't remember the final words that my grandmother Alice ever said to me, I guess because her passing was so natural and unexpected. My other grandmother, Maude, had been in poor health with a myriad of ailments for decades so her passing was not unexpected, but I remember her final words to me because they seemed, at the time, odd, and because they made me cry. I know I've shared this story before, so I apologize for repeating it. My son, who was at the time very young, and I were visiting Maude down on the little house of Mulberry Street in Rising Sun (which was also the one I grew up in, at least until we moved to Lawrenceburg). The visit mainly consisted with my grandmother and I, barely exchanging a word because she was so profoundly deaf, watching my son play with the old toys that we had pulled out of the hall closet, the ones that had entertained generations of kids. When we left she started crying, which really surprised me because I had never seen her cry - and also shocked my father when I shared the story because he had never seen her cry. I asked her what was the matter, and she replied, "Everyone has their favorite, isn't that terrible?" On the way home I had to pull over because it made me cry. As the oldest of the grandchildren I was used to having both grandmothers dote on me, but, as I've said, I always felt a special bond with Maude because I think we shared the same personality, which has always frustrated me because I just don't feel I know much at all about her side of the family, the Evans. Over the years I've thought a lot about the second part of her statement, "isn't that terrible?". On one level she's just saying that no grandmother should have a favorite grandchild, even though, obviously, they do (just as my own mother shamelessly focused on my own son). At the same time I've often thought (and here I'm surely reading too much into the exchange) about the pain of knowing that you love someone more than they could ever love you back. I loved my grandmother, although I'm certain that I didn't love her as much as she loved me - just as I'm certain that my son doesn't love me as much as I love him, because this seems to be the generational logic of relationships. Still, I did love her deeply, and cry every time I visit her grave at the cemetery in Rising Sun when I go home to see my people, as we say in Indiana. At the end of the section Proust adds, "But no, our relations were too fleeting to have been anything but accidental. She no longer knew me, I should never see her again. We had not been created solely for one another; she was a stranger to me." I suspect he's right, although I have trouble going there; or maybe I would have believed that when I was younger and had no faith other than no faith.
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