Doing the right thing doesn't always look the same. It isn't quite as clear cut as sharing crayons, being honest and using your turning signal.
For my mom about ten years ago she went against her gut and did what she concluded was the right thing. While our emotions are not necesarily something to trust cart blanche, going against your gut is rarely the right thing. But for my mom she was forced to choose between her mother and her step-father--a man who really saw and treated her as his own daughter. But in her mind, the right thing was to honor her mother so she severed her relationship with her step-father, the man I knew as my grandpa.
Grandma eventually remarried and my youngest sister knew this new man as her grandpa. I hated him, thinking of my "real" grandpa who I never saw anymore. (I don't think I ever knew why we didn't see him anymore, but I still felt loyal).
Last week, my uncle informed my mom that their stepdad, my "real" grandpa, was in the hospice, down to 65 pounds and on the verge of dying. He had developed Parkinsons and probably would not survive the week.
Guilt overran my mother. The pang that she had ignored refused to leave. We got the family together (my sisters, parents, etc.) and met at the hospice Father's Day to visit him for what we knew was the last time. My mom had been in bed all day--guilt-ridden and sad. When I saw my sister who also remembered this grandpa, the tears trickled down my face. She took my arm and a deep breath, smiled and said, "Be strong. Just be strong." She made a bright face, looked forward and we walked down the hall.
As the group of us made our way to his room, a whistle stopped us and we looked into the comfortably decorated visiting room to our right. There was Grandpa. Sitting in a wheelchair. Looking suspiciously over 65 pounds.
The facts didn't add up. But seeing him for the first time, brought us all to tears. I looked over at my strong sister and the tears were coming too fast for her to wipe away.
He was in a wheelchair. Gaunt but not dying. Suffering and unlikely to recover, but still very much alive.
We hugged him and greeted him one by one. When my mom got to him, he cried. He struggled to get the words out (the disease affects his speech as well as the tears), "It's been a long time." He complimented her on how good she looked. He kept staring at her. He loved her. In all my years, I never knew he had missed us. And I never could have imagined how much he loved my mother. I sat there in the room pondering why we had let so many years go by.
We made small talk and I introduced him to my husband (grandpa had not been invited to my wedding--a mistake I still cannot make out other than the fact that it would have ruined my grandmother's life), and in the middle of all the laughing and joking Grandpa looked up at my mom and told her, "You said you wanted your girls to have a grandmother. You knew they needed a grandmother. And looking at them now it looks like you made a good choice." He was crying as he forced his thoughts into words.
My mom took his hand, tears across her face, and told him she had been wrong. It wasn't the right decision. She had made a mistake. No doubt about it. Someone else said something about the past being the past or something like that and everyone moved on.
Nearly fifteen years of broken relationship healed up just like that.
My grandpa wasn't dying. He is not well, but he's not dying. My overly excitable uncle relayed the wrong information to us (165 pounds became 65 pounds in his mind). But I am so glad he did. I have my grandpa back and he has his family.
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