My Legal Guardian

All the time I spent in school when someone mentioned their parents, my thoughts didn't go to a mom and a dad. They went to a now 76-year-old woman. Her name is Linda and she is my grandmother. She adopted my sister and I when I was three years old. My mom is an addict, as well as my father. He was in prison at the time, and she was literally anywhere else. She ended up coming in and out of our lives for years. I spend my time as a little kid just wondering around the house, laying in my grandma's bed while holding her arm as my doll. I spend my time as a toddler laying on top of her because she was soft. While in school my grandma was the one to sign the papers for enrollment. She was the one to take me to the doctor. She signed the permission slips. She was the one that had to give my own mother permission to pick me up from school. She was a teacher so when I wanted to do something, I had to write an essay as to why I deserved to be able to do it. For a long time as a teenager, I resented her. I was mad that she didn't let me go out. I was mad that she always assumed the worst would happen. I HATED that she always told me what to do. I hated even more that she tried to tell me how to live my life. As if, me a teenager, needed her guidance. Now that I am an adult, I've realized that she is truly my number one best friend. (Right below God, she says.) I've experienced so much heartbreak and so much disappointment in life and all she has ever wanted was good for me. Every time she would say no, or every time she told me how to act, it was for ME, not her. She gave her life just to raise me right. Now, all I do is think of all the times I sat at the foot of her bed or her desk and just watched TV with her. I can't remember any of the conversations we had, but there are a few that make my heart happy. I once told her I felt like I was losing all my friend and she said, "You don't have friends if you're trying to do right. If you lay with dogs, you're gonna get fleas." And I can still hear that in my head when I get lonely. I can still hear her voice singing 'You Are My Sunshine.' to me. As a kid, she would sing that to get me to sleep. Now, she can't breathe as well, so she does what she can sometimes. She is getting smaller, and so is her memory. The hardest part about this friendship is realizing how soon it could end. She likes to take the credit for me being a musician. (She likes to think it was her choice.) She always says that she always wanted a musician in the family. With her love and support and her check book, I have traveled with music, I’ve competed in competitions, I have won awards. I don’t think just anybody would sit there and listen to a 12-year-old play the flute for hours on end if there wasn’t an immense amount of love there. Throughout our friendship, we have shared so many laughs, and so many tears. She once cried in my arms so hard I had to keep her from falling. She looked up at me and said, "I have never in my life let anyone hold me like that." And that broke my heart to hear, but also made me feel blessed, knowing she trusted me enough to be vulnerable, when all my childhood I saw a drill sergeant. I remember hating living at her house. I can recall walking through the living room groaning and saying, “Ugh! I can’t wait until I’m 18!” And she would say, “One day you’ll miss it here.” and I just can’t believe how dumb I was. Throughout my whole life, she made sure I was taken care of. To a lot of people this sounds like a guardian and what they do. But, with my grandma, I can walk into her room and say, “GIRL. You will not believe this!” and she will say back, “GIRL. WHAT?” just as a best friend would. But, an elite best friend because instead of allowing me to react in a petty or useless way, she would guide me to a response that was appropriate. She never tried to change me, but she always let me know what was right by God. She is the only person I can truly say cared enough about my soul to say anything. She gave me advice on boys, friends, money decisions, and she still continues to. Granny Linda would always let me paint her nails, too, but only clear. She allowed me to put makeup on her knowing good and well I probably shouldn’t. She supported me with every fiber of her being. She supported my hair colors, my piercings, my college choices, my marriage choices, and even if she didn’t agree with them, she never once made me feel like less than for any decision I have made. Well, not unless it was the wrong decision, in that case, she let me know, for sure. She always had this look that just made you feel like you messed up. If it was the wrong choice she would turn her head down a bit, move her eyes to look up over her glasses and close her lips real tight, then she'd just let it be known what her opinion was, and she was always right.  I don't think I will ever find a friendship that compares to the one my grandma gives me. It comes with love and support and it also comes with setting me straight. I think that's what friendship is about and it is a friendship that has guided and made the foundation for my entire adulthood.