There must be a light under the bushel!

Granny Goose

To be the matriarch in a family full of eccentrics adds a certain definition of character. Essentially, it makes you the supreme nut!

My grandmother, however, will go down swinging before she ever accepts this fact, much to the delight of the rest of the family.

You see, my grandmother LOVES the idea that we appear to be the perfect family. The rest of us really do our best to overthrow that view.

Just to give you an idea, a couple of years ago, one of my cousins sent out Christmas cards to all of her family and friends. You know the type, sweet picture with the family all decked out in red and green, some velvet required, with beautific smiles (which only took three hours to get just right)? Well, hers had a picture of her oldest son, stripped down to his skivies, with a hand in the toilet!

As much a Grandma was appalled, who could help but laugh? She really does share our twisted sense of humor, although it may not be seemly. (Seemly is meant with a snooty, nasal tone of voice).

This same cousin is the one responsible for my grandmother's nickname, Granny Goose. She also named her dog after my grandmother because she thought it was hilarious that when she called, "Erma," both Grandma and dog turned at the same time!

Well, although Grandma has become rather tolerant of her obnoxious grandkids, she does some strange things herself at times that cause her to become the easy target for undignified, merciless teasing. Unfortunately, many of things she does are usually not meant to be funny, but that just goes to show how little class the rest of us have that we tease her anyhow.

For example, she really enjoys sending presents to people at random times throughout the year, thinking of you because I love you gifts, even though she really doesn't have the money for it. Well, of course we can't tease her about gifts from the heart, but we can sure talk about them behind her back!

My uncle and cousin were in town visiting this weekend, and we, as usual, got around to picking on Grandma (we really do love her!). We discussed all the gadgets and clothing and household decorations we had been sent over the years. We recollected all the recycled gifts that had run through the family and the reactions of what happened when people accidently got back a present they had given to someone years ago.

But, finally we brought up the ULTIMATE gift. Grandma had sent one to both my mother and my uncle, apparently. I recalled with vivid clarity what our reactions were to this outrageous gift.

We got a box delivered on a random day of the year. My mom, my dad, and I were all at my parents house when it came in, and we saw the return address was from Grandma. In typical fashion, we all tried to get each other to open it because we're always scared what we'll find.

Well, my mom finally agreed to do the honors. Once she opened it, she just stood there staring at the contents of the box. All of the sudden, she put a hand over her mouth and turned her face away. I wondered wildly what had caused her to become so upset, so I jumped up and ran over to her.

She turned to me then, and her watery eyes were crinkled at the corners. Why, she wasn't upset at all. I looked in the box, and staring up at me is a picture of my grandmother (taken about twenty years ago) wrapped around a candle. It had some kind of border that looked like flowery wallpaper surrounding the dignified photograph. We took it out and placed it on the bar. And stared at it. We looked at each other, then back at the candle, then back at each other.

"Surely we aren't supposed to light it," said my mother. "Good God, it's like something you would put out at a funeral!"

We didn't know whether to be touched or amused or horrified.

Of course, my grandmother called shortly thereafter, and I made the mistake of answering the phone. She wanted to know if we thought it was as special as she thought it was and how my mother liked it. I've never been good at lying. "Ummmm, it's really unique. We just got it, and Mom was too overcome to call you."

We pulled the candle out of the closet while my uncle was here and considered lighting it since none of us ever had (and Grandma said that when it's lit it's just beautiful). We figured it was too close to Halloween to hold a seance for a living person.