my namom

My grandmother passed away last Tuesday, following the death of my Grandaddy last December. I had the opportunity to speak at the graveside, and this is what I said:

Most of you know this woman as Wanda Faye Price, but to me, Jana, Paxton, Colin, and Kensey, she was our Namom.

I, as the first of the grandchildren, had the unique pleasure of naming her. Im still not really sure how I came up with Namom, but I think it probably had something to do with me being a little girl, already with a strong Texas accent, and a speech impediment, trying to say Grandmom.

My Namom was unlike anyone else's grandmom that I knew— my grandmother was a BLONDE! And, she was always shiny and sparkling. Her shoes sparkled, her pants sparkled, and you better believe her shirt was sparkling too, and if it wasn't purchased that way, she would make it that way! Namom also helped us and our clothes to sparkle and as a little girl, there was not much that topped being sparkly.

My Namom was not one to fuss over you, but in her unique way, she always made me feel special. Some of my first memories of her were going down to visit her and my Grandaddy in a magical place called New Braunfels (Texas) where all you needed was some old bread to befriend the local ducks... and they had Nickelodeon. 

I remember how lucky I felt when Namom and Grandaddy moved  back to Midlothian, and I was gonna have my Namom living in MY town! I spent countless hours in her closet touching all of her clothes and jewelry and trying on all her shoes, my favorite a pair of tall boots that had a zipper all the way up the side. My grandmother had an affinity for boots, this is one of the many traits that she passed down to me.

Being that Namom pretty much let me do whatever I wanted— I liked spending time with her. We would stay up late and watch Jonny Carson, I still like staying up and watching late night TV.  She taught me how to play solitaire, and because she was one of the first people In knew to have a VCR, she let me watch "The Parent Trap" as many times as I wanted to, and she let me eat as much cheese cake as I wanted as well... and boy could I eat some of her homemade cheese cake.

No matter how late we went to sleep, she was always up before me getting Grandaddy fed and off to work. I'd wake up to the smell of fresh cinnamon rolls— she made the BEST cinnamon rolls. I spent many hours watching her, watching her do her hair, watching her doing cross word puzzles, making sandwiches and drinking coffee... well, who am I kidding I wasn't just watching, I was probably talking her ears off, but she listened. I thought  just about everything she did was pretty neat, and her and Grandaddy seemed to always be around to cheer me on too.

I read recently something comparing life to a beautiful flower with it's delicate petals and sweet fragrance, but as we all know the petals will wilt, the fragrance will fade and the flower will die. So what is the solution? We could substitute the real flower with a plastic one, one that never dies. But no, we want the one that dies because it dies, because it is fleeting, and because it fades. This is the very quality that makes life so very precious.

Namom was the last of my grandparents to pass away. Gone is the generation that raised the generation that raised me. So precious are the times and the memories that I have with all of them, and for all the things they taught me.

Immeasurable  is the time that I spent with my grandmother and unforgettable is our blonde, always sparkling, our Namom. 

Both of the images above were taken in New Braunsfels around Easter of 1982. The top one is of my great-grandmother, Vicie, known to me as Mamaw, my Namom, myself, and the one I am choking is my little sister, Jana. The one below is Mamaw, and my Aunt Cathy, my Namom and me.