You meant the world to everyone who knew you; not only your husband or your daughters or your grandkids or your great-grandkids. Distant relatives, thirds, fourth, fifth cousins. Strangers who might’ve only known you from a single meeting. Your impact on other people was unlike any other. Maria said it best. “Your grandmother looks at me and smiles and it makes me feel like she understands me completely… she makes me feel loved without saying a single word”.
Now what am I supposed to do? All I can do is regret the late nights I had to work where I missed all those get togethers at your home. Or the long days when I couldn’t find the energy to come visit for a little while. For what? Money? If I could trade it all to sleepover at grandma’s for another day, I would. I miss those mornings more than anything. Getting up bright and early to the smell of tişmek frying, the Temp-tee being spread over the golden pillows of deliciousness and the Snapple washing it all down. The only thing that could make it better is if it were a Sunday and Fenerbahçe was playing on your satellite TV. That was heaven for me.
You were so much more than a woman, than a mother, than a wife, than a grandmother and on and on. You believed in your husband and moved to the US with your five daughters. You did everything to make sure your family was taken care of. And when tragedy struck earlier than it should’ve, when Allah decided it was time for dede to come home, you stood firm and cemented your place as the matriarch of the family. Your strength was nothing short of admirable not only to me, but everyone else who knew you.
But your best quality was your empathy for others, specifically for my brother and I. A year or so after dede passed away, my parents divorced. I didn’t know what was really going on at the time and, looking back now, I can say it was all thanks to you. You did everything you could to soften the blow of my parents separation. You looked out for us like no other, even when we moved a few states away to start over.
Those summers were some of the best I can recall. We’d stay over on weekends during the school year, but the summers at grandmas felt endless. Even today I tell everyone that my parents didn’t raise me — you did. I’m eternally grateful as I realized years later how formative your care for me, for us, was. I took the love you taught me and gave it to my wife and will give it to my children one day. I wish you could’ve been here to see them, to hold them. But Allah had other ideas for you, and Allah is the best of planners.
I love and miss you so much, anneanne. I know I made you proud with the man I became in spite of the challenges I faced growing up. And I know I’ll continue to do so as you look and care over me from up above, just as you did in the Hawthorne house, Hillman, the Clifton garden apartments and Main Street, Paterson. I can’t wait to tell my kids all about you when we visit…
