Published: 11th July 2007
Writer: Proton Beck
Goodbye Pub-Grandma
Everybody has a grandma. I had a very special one.
Yes, I must admit, I was grandma’s favorite. No mollycuddle but grandma’s sweet boy. Only a few times in life you meet someone like that. I mean such a very special person with whom you have that strange chemestry. You can communicate by just looking in eachothers eyes. One glance is enough to speak without words. Everybody has someone like that. And when you are very lucky, you’ll have that with more than one human in your life.
To listen, that is what I learned from her. Her stories were beautiful, always about the past. How life was in the old days. The days before WOII and during the war. You know how it is, the older they get, the more they live in the past. As a boy I liked that. I could listen for hours. Filling in the rest of the stories with my own imagination. What ever happened with that Jewish man that went along door to door, street after street, winter and summer, selling yarn? He never came back after the war. Did they ever find the bodies of those Germans shot in our local swamp? How hungry can you be, to eat flowerbulbs?
How is it to be the most wealthy family in the street, having a television before no one ever saw such a thing? The first black-and-white broadcast of Philips, the Dutch multinational! They were there. She saw it.
My grandma was special. She had an opinion. Not the type of housewife behind the man, but the woman in front. Keeping the business going at home. A pub. Yes dear readers, Proton had a “pub-grandma”. A kind of Irish pub, but not in Ireland. No, deep in the south of Holland. Close to the Belgium border.
She was rich and parsimoniously. Sometimes she surprised me with a sudden statement. She did not like our monarchy. That kept me thinking for days. My grandma, a republician? In those days, that was almost the same as being a communist and certainly the contrary of the rules of the Catholic church.
When I got older, I realized life isn’t all black-and-white. Always put a story in the correct context of time and situation. Only then you understand the real meaning of your memories.
I had a grandma from which one memory is engraved. A women with grey hair and a typical granny-dress. And special granny jewels. They always looked more expense then they realy were. I think. A brooch is such a typical granny thing.
A grandma with warm memories. I never forgot the glass of water she gave me after I was almost hit by a car. Right in front of her home. The car stopped just a inch away of killing me. I was shaking like a leaf. When I came in, she gave me a glass of water. ‘Please drink, she said’. ‘It will calm you’ Since then a glass of water has never given me that special feeling of being safe and secure again. But the memory is forever….
Would she have liked Second Life? Yes she would! I’m sure, she would have bought a laptop. That’s why I alway have a piece of her with me when I’m in Second Life. She’s always there when I am on one of my adventures.
The holy Mary and doing a pilgrimage to Lourdes in France is a important issue in a Catholic life. Catholic faith knows many saints and of course is Mary as mother of Jesus one of the most important saints. If not so, the most important one. I’m not such a churchgoer, but born as a Catholic, you get some substance in life. I alway liked the Catholic faith. It’s a happy religion. Sinners are alway forgiven. The condemned can be saved. There is a hell, okay; but along the way, you can get off the train in time. Even on your death bed, you get your last chance!
Now,….please forgive me, I’m getting way to serious
Let’s go back..
My grandma gave me a medaillon from Lourdes. A medaillon with Mary dressed in blue presenting herself to Bernadette. In 2008 exactly 150 years ago. It’s really cool to wear this hanging from a short silver necklace. I had this necklace copied in SL. It’s custom made by Alyssa Bijoux. I asked her for the prices of custum jewelry. It wasn’t so expensive. Only L$250 per design. I gave her a picture of a blue and silver version. I wear them quite frequently. Of course when matching the rest off the outfit. And, by all means, Mary isn’t present when I’m in a ‘natural mood’. 
So, now I have a piece of warm memories, a piece of protection, always with me. A special place in my inventory, a special place in my heart.
I still miss her so bad.
CU
Proton
