Well, here goes..
Although I have only discovered this website in the last week’s time, when I took a brief tour browsing various requests with stories unique, heartbreaking, inspiring, and even those that made left me with a higher sense of gratitude when it came to thinking that my life was anything but easy or grand, lavish or notable. I often feel stuck in a cycle of unintentionally consistent hardships, tribunals, turmoil, and discouragement. However, this isn’t the point. I want to potentially stand out for something else, and as much as focusing on anything but my survival, right now I find peace and fulfillment, perhaps even joy I dare say, as happiness is an emotion I’m not often familiarized with. Maybe this isn’t what those of you reading this typically encounter, but that is why I want you And I to focus on my grandma. Elizabeth, or Beth as myself and my five siblings have always called her, turns 79. I write this here because as warm a day as a birthday should bring, reflecting on it has brought a certain melancholy to me. Beth is an extraordinary woman. Why, one might ask? She was not acquainted with John F. Kennedy. She did not earn a herself a Grammy (no pun intended) or an Olympic Gold Medal. She wasn’t the first to woman to vote and won’t be the last. Beth was none of these things, but what she did do, who she was and is to this day; Those are what makes Beth radiant and irreplaceable. Beth has spread her love and compassion for since even my father can remember. Her understanding and nurturing nature along with her age-defying witt and never-boring, sassy lick of humor have kept her with mind sharp, and allowed such a grace of a human to stay with us nearly 8 decades on. She hasn’t always had it easy. She’s moved about the country, a single mother on her own dozens of times to make a better life for her two boys. She worked well past the age she could have retired, even through her battle and defeat of cancer, never showing a hint of less than the will and determination to keep moving forward and pick up anyone who she could along the way. That’s Beth. Her damn fine work ethic would make many impressed, and her ability to overcome hardship, health, highs, and lows over time are unmatched by any other tens of thousand if not upward of another ten thousand times that of who I have met or crossed paths with since my dad became his own man and I, his son. I am nearing 30 now. Now the thing is, what got me writing here.. you may not know it, you may not have known of Beth at all for it not this insight to her soul I write to you, but Beth while perhaps ordinarily extraordinary or extraordinarily ordinary, she does not and has not ever gotten the recognition she deserves. If I could, and I believe if anybody who knew her like myself or my family or her family (and to Beth everyone she knows and who knows her is family), we would sculpt her image for Ellis Island, or etch contrails of our pride in her into the sky. The president would award her the Medal of Freedom, and leader’s alike would gather in unison to call for peace, even if just for a moment, to applaud and celebrate her life. But you and I know how life can be. We may not weather it like my grandma has either, always fierce; We may weather at time more like choppy seas without a compass, at times no land in sight. Beth took care of us. She took care of my dad, my mother before she was my mother, my older sisters and brother and myself and my younger sister. She took care of my uncle, to this day helping to care for even his children through a frightening medical crisis. It’s time we take care of her. It’s time we show her a symbol of love dedicated to Beth, the definition of it.
This doesn’t come without an immense amount of fear, indescribable hope or maybe naive delusions of grandeur however.. you see, I found this website because I am in the pit of pits of life. Hear me out, this isn’t the part where you realize you’ve been duped and Beth was some kind of piece of the con, simply detail or background so you may understand why or how I could speak of someone so fondly and yet be in this virtual part of the void, begging.. yeah.., begging for some money (I suppose it is to be coined this terminology given the name of the domain). I originally had thought to write here for myself. To complain about what was hard, that I’ve lost 2 friends lately, one to suicide. That a third has been missing for 3 weeks without a trace. That I’m embarrassingly behind on my rent and other debts in life, that I’m almost 30 and can’t afford a license, I’ve been bouncing doctors and homes for the entirety of adulthood and faces traumas I hope I never have to repeat or relive. All of my siblings have children now as well, and half of my siblings are struggling themselves with things such as rent too, surgeries they don’t know how to afford, or feeding themselves enough every day. My brother, former Army medic and veteran of the war in Afghanistan (an inspiring story for another day) has just returned home after successfully completing a 90 day drug addiction program. Between employment, their own families, strokes of unforeseen and less than ideal luck, struggle, Covid-19, the increasing cost of living, stress, and so much more, I can honestly say that money is something all of us, even my dad, freshly retired from 29 years a fireman following serving too in the Army and the first Gulf War, who is also very supportive, extending his hand to us wherever possible, are scarce on money. It aches.
It’s hard to be positive. It’s hard to see hope. What’s special is I think that each one of us tries to be the light when we cannot see the light for ourselves. Maybe we got a little Beth in us.
I have pocket change to my name. Beth does not equate to, nor is a pocket of coin change, she is the change. And while having her to call our grandmother or for my dad, ‘Mom,’ I want what has been too ordinary for too long, to become the extraordinary, and that needs to change. No more stale salutations. If Beth can always be better than herself, I can too, so this day, this particular day is for her because selflessness is her specialty.
Please, whatever you’re able to do or contribute, be it send a message, a card, a donation, flowers, a personalized video, a pilot’s knowledge to make those contrails come to life.. her home paid off even.. whatever you can do.. I plead with you, I’ll BEG, do it for Beth today. My PayPal is negative but less than $20 under, so clearing that to receive these (if any 🤞🏼) will unfortunately be a do slight cover, but I will happily face another day of hardship myself because I know she has taught all of my family how to persevere and be strong, and I will continue to practice that attitude every moment of every day if it means I too can one day gain even a part of the love that my grandma shows and spreads in any way, every day, always. She is growing to be the age we all begin to keep a close eye on.
I don’t know what will come of this, but it’s made my day truly and most unexpectedly.. I no longer find feelings of doubt or being scared, or even hyper fixation on my day to day problems or seemingly trivial conflicts.
Today, I just want grandma Beth to know she is cherished and absolutely adored; a day of pure, overflowing gratitude and appreciation for her.
Thank you for reading, it means a lot to me, and Happy Birthday Grandma Beth. WE LOVE YOU!!!!!