I have been trying to avoid it. What else is there to write about, I ask myself, so much else has been going on. But since she was one of my greatest blog supporters, maybe she is not letting me go on without a bit of acknowledgement.

So here you go Gran, but only under the condition that you promise not to spy on J and me on the second floor, or there will definitely not be grandbabies as I will be too nervous to even change clothes let alone anything else. Because, yes, I have heard that you are back. As you read this over John or Mary’s shoulder in your living room, filled with your art and furniture and flowers, flutter a leaf or dim a light or something to let us know that peeping will not be a pastime. I can just hear you now, “Hell, it’s my house, I can peep all I want!” True, and I guess there really is no way to stop you. Locked doors don’t work, huh?

Oh, and Gran, sorry about all the canned goods. They were so neat-looking in the pantry, with faded labels and foreign wording, but I was in a cleaning and sorting mood, trying to help out after our early morning journey with you to the mainland, trying to do something to help your family, and well, they just got sorted. Out.

But I will never ever forget your apple cake, and your instructions for picking lobsters, and your beautifully manicured hands, and your warm, mischievous smile. I won’t forget the morning I first met you at the Greyhound Station after an overnight ride from New York City: It was early summer and you took J and I to the European Bakery for pastries and coffee and then on a tour of beautiful houses in Falmouth Foreside and the trees were green and the flowers (you could name every pink and violet petal we passed) were in bloom and J and I shyly smiled at each other as I rubbed my eyes and breathed in the fresh air of Maine and laughed with this amazing grandmother. You are every bit the definition of Maine, of Chebeague Island, as the ferry ride and the big white captains house and the rough, rocky islands we sailed to in Casco Bay. You are seaweed pudding and applecake and baskets in the kitchen and make-sure-you-check-the-expiration-date jars of homemade jam and relish. You are gardening and compost piles and pancake mornings and books in the library and the North Road. You are the Old Stone and the boatyard and scotch in the afternoon and the Golf Club and picnics at Deer Point. Kindness and boldness and yankee heartiness and reserved but radiant love.

So Gran, I didn’t really mean to write this all about you in life. I was going to talk about the early morning when you ceased to be. But such a statement now seems completely untrue. You are in the air and rocks and trees of the island, and yes, the house. Literally. Just, please, a little privacy, just at night even, just a little privacy would be grand. If that’s a shelf trembling No, I am sure we’ll find out soon. You were never one for subtle reactions.

It was swell knowing you here, Gran.

And no, I was not full of shit; it was truly one of the most wonderful nights of my life, being with you and your family, blood and otherwise, in your house full of love on your island in the sea.

Thanks for waiting.