I lost my grandmother back in June, and it sucked. (I know this seems depressing so far, but read me out. It gets better, I promise.) You see, most kids see their grandparents as kind old people who show up at Christmas with warm cookies and a hand-knitted sweaters. But, I saw my Gram as a friend, a pal, and a confidant.
My brother and I were lucky enough to have spent oodles of time with Gram and Gramps when we were munchkins. They babysat us every Monday night while my mom went back to school and my dad worked afternoons.
I have wonderful memories of spaghetti dinners (or sketty as Gramps called it), Wheel of Fortune, dunkin cookies, and picture books.
Gram used to put me on her lap and read me these wonderful tales about this freckled little kid named Sam and his group of friends. My favorite charatcer was Jenny, who was kind of a bitch, but she had a kick ass closet of dress up clothes. I would’ve put up with her if she let me play in that closet.
I lived for these books. In fact, I made Gram read them to me over and over and over and over again. She only had three of them because they were out of print and extremely hard to find. According to my mom, Gram used to scour the bookstores in downtown Chicago hoping to find more. But, I was content and kept on rereading them.
As I grew older our time together began to consist of other things: Golden Girls reruns, shopping trips to Kohl’s (She was always up for helping me pick out a cute girlie shirt.), phone calls about my disastrous life, and what happened on the most recent episode of Ugly Betty. And, so I forgot about Sam and Jenny…until this June, when she passed away.
The day she died, I went over to Sassy’s for comforting. Unfortunately, his way of offering support consisted of getting laid and then telling me he was thinking of moving out of state. Another reason why I’m soooooo much better off without his hairy ass, but I digress.
As I lie (did I use this right? Lie and lay always screws me up.) on his child-sized bed, staring up at his stupid Spiderman posters (Yeah, he actually had them. Dude was 30. I mean, that’s cute when you’re like 12, but a grown man with freaking Spiderman posters? Should've been a major red flag.) trying to hold back the tears brewing from such an emotional day, I randomly thought of how special those times when Gram would read me those stories were. The things you realize when someone’s gone, huh?
So, just three weeks later I found myself on my Mumsie’s couch, grieving over Sassy’s decision to throw me back into the ocean of single women, and once again Sam and Jenny popped into my head.
At that moment I just knew I had to get my hands on those books. The problem was, I could not remember what exactly they were called. My usually awesome memory had failed me, and all I could remember was that they were about Sam and Jenny, and Jenny was a bitch with cute clothes.
So, I emailed my cousins to see if Gram ever read the books to them. Eureka! She had! But, no one else could recall the name of the series either.
My mom and I searched the internet for hours, attempting different search terms. Nothing. I was crushed. Finding these books had become an obsession. I just had to recapture that part of my childhood. I wanted those memories back so badly.
During one of my searches I randomly stumbled upon some research paper about teaching kids to share, and the writer quoted Jenny Learns a Lesson, which just happened to be my favorite of the three books Gram had! Yay for me and my Google search engine skills.
But, I was faced with the problem Gram had years ago. These books were still out of print. The only way I could get them would be to buy used copies from people on Amazon. I really didn’t want to do that. I’m not very trusting. But, I was content that I had at least found them, and if I decided to take the leap of Amazon faith, I knew I could always change my mind and order them later on. I knew their names, and I knew they were out there…somewhere.
Three months later, the day before my little brother’s wedding in fact, my cousin wrote on my FB wall: I have a surprise for you.
I seriously had an instant vision of her handing me the books and me crying. It would be so freakin’ cool if that happened! I thought to myself. And, you just might be a little psychic.
She arrived at the wedding, and I pretty much attacked her. “Where’s my surprise?!?!?!” And get this! She made me wait for over two hours before revealing what she had for me. How mean is that?
K-you know I love you. But, that was so not fun.
So, we trudged out into the rainy September afternoon and what does she pull out of the back of my aunt’s minivan?
The books! All three of them! In their bookish glory!
Apparently, my aunt found them while cleaning out Gram’s house and was about to give them away to the Salvation Army when my awesome little cuz spotted them, remembering that I had asked her about them months ago.
I hugged Sam and Jenny’s adventures to my chest and wiped away a couple of tears. I can’t even describe the feelings of happiness that washed over me at that moment. Plus, I think I’m psychic now. Maybe I can get my own hotline.
That’s a pretty freakin’ sweet story, don’t ya think?
My brother and I were lucky enough to have spent oodles of time with Gram and Gramps when we were munchkins. They babysat us every Monday night while my mom went back to school and my dad worked afternoons.
I have wonderful memories of spaghetti dinners (or sketty as Gramps called it), Wheel of Fortune, dunkin cookies, and picture books.
Gram used to put me on her lap and read me these wonderful tales about this freckled little kid named Sam and his group of friends. My favorite charatcer was Jenny, who was kind of a bitch, but she had a kick ass closet of dress up clothes. I would’ve put up with her if she let me play in that closet.
I lived for these books. In fact, I made Gram read them to me over and over and over and over again. She only had three of them because they were out of print and extremely hard to find. According to my mom, Gram used to scour the bookstores in downtown Chicago hoping to find more. But, I was content and kept on rereading them.
As I grew older our time together began to consist of other things: Golden Girls reruns, shopping trips to Kohl’s (She was always up for helping me pick out a cute girlie shirt.), phone calls about my disastrous life, and what happened on the most recent episode of Ugly Betty. And, so I forgot about Sam and Jenny…until this June, when she passed away.
The day she died, I went over to Sassy’s for comforting. Unfortunately, his way of offering support consisted of getting laid and then telling me he was thinking of moving out of state. Another reason why I’m soooooo much better off without his hairy ass, but I digress.
As I lie (did I use this right? Lie and lay always screws me up.) on his child-sized bed, staring up at his stupid Spiderman posters (Yeah, he actually had them. Dude was 30. I mean, that’s cute when you’re like 12, but a grown man with freaking Spiderman posters? Should've been a major red flag.) trying to hold back the tears brewing from such an emotional day, I randomly thought of how special those times when Gram would read me those stories were. The things you realize when someone’s gone, huh?
So, just three weeks later I found myself on my Mumsie’s couch, grieving over Sassy’s decision to throw me back into the ocean of single women, and once again Sam and Jenny popped into my head.
At that moment I just knew I had to get my hands on those books. The problem was, I could not remember what exactly they were called. My usually awesome memory had failed me, and all I could remember was that they were about Sam and Jenny, and Jenny was a bitch with cute clothes.
So, I emailed my cousins to see if Gram ever read the books to them. Eureka! She had! But, no one else could recall the name of the series either.
My mom and I searched the internet for hours, attempting different search terms. Nothing. I was crushed. Finding these books had become an obsession. I just had to recapture that part of my childhood. I wanted those memories back so badly.
During one of my searches I randomly stumbled upon some research paper about teaching kids to share, and the writer quoted Jenny Learns a Lesson, which just happened to be my favorite of the three books Gram had! Yay for me and my Google search engine skills.
But, I was faced with the problem Gram had years ago. These books were still out of print. The only way I could get them would be to buy used copies from people on Amazon. I really didn’t want to do that. I’m not very trusting. But, I was content that I had at least found them, and if I decided to take the leap of Amazon faith, I knew I could always change my mind and order them later on. I knew their names, and I knew they were out there…somewhere.
Three months later, the day before my little brother’s wedding in fact, my cousin wrote on my FB wall: I have a surprise for you.
I seriously had an instant vision of her handing me the books and me crying. It would be so freakin’ cool if that happened! I thought to myself. And, you just might be a little psychic.
She arrived at the wedding, and I pretty much attacked her. “Where’s my surprise?!?!?!” And get this! She made me wait for over two hours before revealing what she had for me. How mean is that?
K-you know I love you. But, that was so not fun.So, we trudged out into the rainy September afternoon and what does she pull out of the back of my aunt’s minivan?
The books! All three of them! In their bookish glory!
Apparently, my aunt found them while cleaning out Gram’s house and was about to give them away to the Salvation Army when my awesome little cuz spotted them, remembering that I had asked her about them months ago.
I hugged Sam and Jenny’s adventures to my chest and wiped away a couple of tears. I can’t even describe the feelings of happiness that washed over me at that moment. Plus, I think I’m psychic now. Maybe I can get my own hotline.
That’s a pretty freakin’ sweet story, don’t ya think?
