Grand Avenue by Mike Thompson for September 15, 2023

Very special indeed.

Yep! Grands are the best! Whether they be the Grandkids or the Grandparents!

i call her katie bear

Most of mine call me by my first name. It’s never bothered me, since that is my name.

Grandma is a special name!

I was jealous that my cousins could use my mom’s name (with ‘aunt’, of course) but I couldn’t, until I realized what a privilege it was that I could call her mom.

When I was 9 I answered the phone and they asked if “Bertha” was there. I told them they had the wrong number. My mom walked into the kitchen and asked who was that. I told her someone wanting a Bertha. She goes, “That’s me ya dipsh*t”. Thankfully they called back and Mom was able to talk to her sister. I was 7 the last time we were back in Jersey. It was right after we’d left Germany and then we visited relatives all across the country so I truly had no recollection of people back home calling her that. That was when I found out she started using her middle name as soon as she left home. I took my girls to visit Jersey and Mom met us part of the way. Hearing everyone up there calling her “Bertha” or “Aunt Berbie” was surreal. But not as weird or funny as watching my mother trying not to curse in front of her family. She lasted 5 hours! My late mother could out-do anyone on the planet when it comes to swearing. She was born in 1938, so the “nice old lady” trope never applied to her.

It bemused me that second cousins on Mom’s side called Grandma “Aunt Edna” and second cousins on Dad’s side called Aunt Edna “Grandma.”