Resonating Words

The whole world might have celebrated the New Year with the hope of a better future to come. I reflected back on a previous New Year when my maternal grandmother passed away. I could never remember a loss that was deeper than what I felt then. It is more than ten years on but I keep remembering her and miss her presence.

My main memory of her was that she was bed bound by depression. I can only recall few times that I would see her in a seated position and that usually so happened to be around meal times. Otherwise she would lay on a sofa or a bed. She would be smoking away her cigarettes, with a cold over sweetened tea by her side.

Meanwhile, she would still notice and call out for each grandchild who happened to be bobbing around, “Beebe Habeebe” with much encompassing and overwhelming love and a wide smile, the like I have only seen in an innocent child.

That was the way I remember her yet that did not say enough about her life. The foreigner, who was full of life, came with her ultra modern looks and style. Her beauty was compared to that of Marilyn Monroe’s and she used to display all photographs of her young self in her bed room until the day she died. She was heavy with depression yet her red lipstick never left her lips.

I used to wonder about my grandmother and often asked about the turning points in her life. I was too young to know within a generation that was too conservative to tell. Certain things were viewed as a social stigma mixed with superstitious thoughts that would blame things on the evil eye that is fuelled by jealousy.

 It could well have been the loss of her young daughter? That could distress the best of minds.  I always wondered if she had the chance to really speak her mind and confide her fears or wishes in someone, whether she talked about her joy and pain. I wished I could have done something to help, but not sure if anything would have changed or all would have remained the same.

 I remember her every New Year and remember her with every smile on my baby’s face. For it reminds me of her smile. I will forever remember her fondly. Even the cigarette wholes on her bed that said she was there. I remember her with great love and wonder if we somehow impact our elders as much as they impact us.