Flowing Underneath.

It's a shitstorm.

My Dad’s parents lived in Houston when I was a kid in what I considered to be a mansion. It had two floors, a staircase that seemed grand to me, and a bar in the living room where I could sneak in, close the door, and serve my patrons. I am only realizing as I type that both of my grandparents had full on, stocked bars in their houses. What a time to be alive.

My first “business” was running the bar at my maternal Grandparents’ downstairs where I would sell apple juice, soda, and snacks that my Grandma Keke had purchased at Costco (yes we had a charter membership). On special days, hot dogs were on offer. I demanded payment from my customers aka my aunts, uncles, cousins, and sibling. I remember overhearing my sister complaining to my Grandma with extreme exasperation, “Keke, you can’t let her collect money for things she didn’t even buy!” My sister was always trying to shut down my businesses - lemonade stands, handmade ornaments (aka piece of shit wood scraps I’d picked up off the ground at the Christmas tree lot and glued glitter to), custom children’s books - but I didn’t let her dampen my entrepreneurial zest. As a child it really took a lot for anyone to de-zest me. I don’t really know why but I just would bulldog onwards and do my thing.

I also had a temper. I could really let it rip and, under the right circumstances, I still can. I’ve gone to a lot of therapy and figured out where it came from (Dead Dad Club, represent!) and these days most of my delicious ass-ripping gets saved for scripts, for characters who really need to let it fly, and it feels so good to put those words into someone else’s mouth. But, there have been times in my life before I understood what was bubbling underneath where I didn’t keep a lid on it. And those times could be a little yikes.

My Dad’s father passed away when I was in college, leaving my Grandma Jean on her own in that big house in Houston. She was a complicated gal, an upper class 1950’s house wife who golfed and said things to me like “Don’t meddle!” accompanied by a hand slap when I once tried to play with some silverware she’d set out on a table before people were coming over. I was STUNNED. Keke would NEVER do that to me. But Grandma Jean didn’t even bat an eye and sauntered off to greet her guests. She wore button down shirts, slacks, sensible shoes. She ate a grapefruit every morning with one of those weird half-spoons that had a serrated edge. She loved chugging Blush and would wiggle her glass at me and say “More vino!” until I gave her a hearty pour of a refill. Her neck skin had begun to sag and I called it her “waddle” like a turkey and I’d grab it and give it a big wiggle. That didn’t go over so well. As a kid I thought she was pretty boring. I never once saw her swim in a pool, she never played pretend with me, or told me a joke. She had a cat named Saffron who was a TOTAL BITCH, who hissed and clawed at everyone (including her) and she’d drawl “Saffron, don’t be nasty!” in that thick Texas accent of hers while that freak of a feline tried to slice her damn face off. Needless to say, Grandma Jean wasn’t my uber-best Grandparent friend. But, she was my Grandma.

She also happened to have a journalism degree from the University of Missouri, one of the best journalism undergrad programs in the country, and went to college at time where most women went straight into marriage and motherhood. This didn’t resonate with me at all as a kid but that gal was no dumb-dumb.

I was home in California for the holidays when she died. The holidays are always a charged time for my clan because all of the heavy hitters in our family decided to cross over between the dates of December 22-28. For years, that manifested in a lot of avoidance and then what I eventually started calling “The Christmas Family Argument” where there’d be some big blow up and all the emotional sewage that was flowing underneath came out in a fight. The pressure got released, no one had to talk about what was really going on, and then we had Christmas. It was a great cycle.

Grandma Jean died on December 22nd, the same day my beloved maternal Grandfather had died years earlier. By that point she’d been living with dementia and other health issues in assisted living for quite some time and, in many ways, her death was not unexpected. But in other ways it was. That woman was like a cat with nine lives; she had survived ovarian cancer, emotional breakdowns, infections, the death of her son, the death of her husband, and a zillion other things, yet she always bounced back. We used to joke that she’d outlive us all and sometimes I honestly wondered if she would. Maybe eating all that grapefruit, chugging vino, and being clawed at by a bitch of a cat had some benefits. When she finally died I didn’t cry. I don’t think any of us did. We all felt an element of relief. Her final years had been difficult and now she was finally at peace, reunited with her husband and my Dad on the other side. But, it was Christmastime and I had a new dead family member and it was going to come out somewhere.

A few days after she passed I was running errands in our neighborhood and I had to get something from the mall. Traffic was bad and I was in a bad, bad mood. At the time I chalked it up to people pissing me off, other people doing things to me, and I did not have the wherewithal to zoom out and tap into how I was actually feeling. I turned down a street that led to the mall and wound up smack behind a car that was traveling no more than 12 miles per hour. Literally. “Are you fucking kidding me?!” I thought to myself. I pursed my lips, rolled my eyes, heaved a pissed off sigh, and got right on their tail as if to say, “Step on the gas, losers!” Newsflash: it didn’t work. They kept right on driving at negative speed, not paying attention to the person behind them, not clocking my threatening messages. I got closer and closer with my car. “HELLO! I AM BEHIND YOU! SPEED UP!” Every time I inched forward the tension would build in my chest, my face was getting hotter, my eyes started to feel almost wet. But they just kept putt-putting along. Finally I got right on their tail and started honking. I believe this is what the French call “Le Road Ragé” and I accept that diagnosis. I was honking, swearing, ripping into these poor people whilst operating a vehicle. Their car went a bit farther down the road and then their blinker turned on and they slowly, ohhhh so slowly, pulled into a driveway. I gunned it past them, flipping them off, and saw them stare at me with horror as I blazed by. It wasn’t until I was almost at the mall that I realized the scared individuals staring at me were two very old, sweet looking, probably Grandparent people. I zoomed into the mall lot, slammed my car into park, turned off the ignition, and then promptly began sobbing. Big, heavy sobs. Emotional sewage flowing like lava out my eye holes sobs. I was so sad. I was sad my Grandma Jean had died. I missed her.

I don’t even know if I went inside to the mall or not. All I remember is, after pulling myself together, I knew what I had to do. I turned my car back on, drove back down the street, and scanned the block for the white car I’d terrorized shortly before. It was still in their driveway.

I parked and took a deep breath. I got out, walked to the front door, and gently knocked. The sweet old woman answered. “Yes?” She said. “Can I help you?” I almost started crying before getting a word out but I muscled through. “Were you just driving a short while ago and someone was driving erratically behind you?” “Yes! That person scared us so much we -” I cut her off. “That was me. I owe you an apology.” And then the tears came and I blubbered out, covering my face with my hands, “I am so sorry. My Grandmother just died and I just…I don’t know why I did that and I am so, so, so sorry.” Her face softened. She cocked her head slightly to the right and looked at me with a touch of confusion but mainly compassion. “Oh, honey.” She paused. “Come here.” And then that woman hugged me. The woman who I had frightened, who didn’t know me, who could have called the police on me, hugged me. She was old and wrinkly and soft and smelled a little bit like cats. In that moment, it felt like Grandma Jean was giving me the soft hug I’d always wanted from her. I held on tight. I thanked the woman for her kindness, apologized one last time, and walked back to my car. She watched me through the screen door, most likely a little stunned by our exchange. I paused and looked at her and waved. She waved back. I pulled out onto the street and drove, very slowly, until I got home.

This last week was a hard one. Sick kiddos, sick husband, lost sleep, lost sense of place. The fire feels far away and it feels almost more present than ever. It’s like that lull that comes a few months after someone has died: the funeral has passed, the immediate scrambling is over, the casseroles have ceased. But I’ve been holding it together and bulldogging onward, like I tend to do. I’ve been a bit cranky but I haven’t tailgated anyone or run anyone off the road. But I’ve known something was up and something was off. Two nights ago I was folding five loads of laundry and watching an episode of “Hacks.” Right before the credits rolled, they paid tribute to the LA Wildfire First Responders and Victims over a photo of a pink mansion where they used to film. That house was in Altadena, blocks from where we lived. I used to drive by it. That house is now gone. And I sat there in my living room and wept. I covered my face with my hands and wept. I am so sad. I am sad I lost my house. I miss it. And I know I always will.