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If you were to look through pictures of my Grandma, Norma Mae Chrasstil, you would have a tough time finding one without her holding her chin up. I never noticed it before, I never saw past her being my Grandma, but now I see her for the woman she was before she was my Grandma. I see the elegance that exuded from her during her 20’s and 30’s and into my father’s childhood.
She never lost that elegance. She colored her hair and got perms almost as religiously as she went to Catholic Mass. She never looked her age. She always wore makeup and she never forgot to cover her head with a handkerchief before going outside.
When I was a kid I remember going to my Grandma’s house when my parents picked me up sick from school. My Grandma would always be ready to ease my stomach with a can of chili, Vienna sausages, chocolate pudding and a Pepsi.
Every Easter my Grandma would cook my favorite dish, hamballs (don’t knock them until you try them), and she would save a few back for me to eat the next day. She also made the only potato salad I have ever liked. After we ate, all of the grandkids would climb through a hole in the fence of the backyard to hunt Easter eggs that our parents had hidden in the prairie grass field behind her house.
That field was also home to the most impressive Weeping Willow tree you would ever see. I spent hours in that tree. Sometimes it was a pirate ship, other times it was a spaceship, other times it was a clubhouse or a hideout.
The only thing separating the grass field behind her home with Holmes Lake in Lincoln was a giant dam that made a perfect hill for sledding. I ate snow plenty of times after face planting into the side of that dam.
I never forgot Elvis’ birthday and would always spend it at my Grandma’s watching Elvis movie marathons, though my Grandma would always watch her soaps in another room.
My Grandma never raised her voice and was never stern. When she was angry or disappointed her eyebrows would curl down in the middle and she would lower her chin. She never looked mean. She always had readily supplied jars of M&M’s and Oreos and always had a box of each grandkid’s favorite cereal.
If you were to look through pictures of my Grandma, Norma Mae Chrasstil, you would have a tough time finding one without her holding her chin up. I never noticed it before, I never saw past her being my Grandma, but now I see her for the woman she was before she was my Grandma. I see the elegance that exuded from her during her 20’s and 30’s and into my father’s childhood.
She never lost that elegance. She colored her hair and got perms almost as religiously as she went to Catholic Mass. She never looked her age. She always wore makeup and she never forgot to cover her head with a handkerchief before going outside.
When I was a kid I remember going to my Grandma’s house when my parents picked me up sick from school. My Grandma would always be ready to ease my stomach with a can of chili, Vienna sausages, chocolate pudding and a Pepsi.
Every Easter my Grandma would cook my favorite dish, hamballs (don’t knock them until you try them), and she would save a few back for me to eat the next day. She also made the only potato salad I have ever liked. After we ate, all of the grandkids would climb through a hole in the fence of the backyard to hunt Easter eggs that our parents had hidden in the prairie grass field behind her house.
That field was also home to the most impressive Weeping Willow tree you would ever see. I spent hours in that tree. Sometimes it was a pirate ship, other times it was a spaceship, other times it was a clubhouse or a hideout.
The only thing separating the grass field behind her home with Holmes Lake in Lincoln was a giant dam that made a perfect hill for sledding. I ate snow plenty of times after face planting into the side of that dam.
I never forgot Elvis’ birthday and would always spend it at my Grandma’s watching Elvis movie marathons, though my Grandma would always watch her soaps in another room.
My Grandma never raised her voice and was never stern. When she was angry or disappointed her eyebrows would curl down in the middle and she would lower her chin. She never looked mean. She always had readily supplied jars of M&M’s and Oreos and always had a box of each grandkid’s favorite cereal.
I always believed part of her heart was lost with my Grandpa, who died of a heart attack at age 50. The pacemaker she carried was proof of this. Though her heart was partly broken, it was one of the strongest hearts I knew. Its condition never hindered her. She walked every day and delivered newspapers at her assisted living community in Lincoln.
After my uncle, her youngest son, died five months ago her heart finally broke completely. There was nothing that could heal it. Minutes before she died I played the guitar for her. I played Eric Clapton’s “Tears in Heaven.” As her breathing grew more strenuous, I set my guitar on the floor and held her hand. She died minutes later. I know she’s not crying anymore.
