Hazel

Never was a lipstick girl

Growing up
I loved the smell
Loved the way it looked on the women in my family

On the women in the old movies I watched

But it never seemed to suit me
Every now and again
I would gravitate toward a particular shade

I wore it of course
On stage

But in real life
It never stuck

Red lipstick personality
I am not

Much more suited to a gloss or balm
Or nothing

My eyes have always been
My “best feature”
The most celebrated

With crooked teeth and a sizable overbite
My mouth is sort of the last feature I want to draw attention to

But I do love the idea of it
I have a tube in nearly every color of the rainbow

Out of some strange compulsion
I almost always have a shade or two on me

I think it must be because of her

My Grandmother
On my Mother’s side

I always called her Grammie

She died two days ago
At 94
One minute she was
The next she wasn’t

We haven’t talked in years
She never met My Love
She never saw my children

Which feels like it should be terrible
Because she was one of the people that raised me

For a giant part of my life
We were extremely close

But we drifted
As sometimes happens

It was actually less drift
More conscious detachment on my part

The details are too much for here
And they were terrible
In their way
Though now
After her death
They seem
Not less important

But less solid

Still
Boundaries sometimes mean
We aren’t close to people we love
When they die

And she chose her circumstances

Still

Upon hearing of her death

I remember

That she always sat up with me when I was scared at night

We lived with her and my Grandpa
After my parents divorce
While my Mom was at work
And at school

She sat at the table and colored with me for hours

Taught me about Marigolds 

Hyacinths

And sweeping sidewalks

She taught me to garden
To paint
To put my things away

She taught me to iron
She danced to Henry Mancini with me

She told me once
“Getting dressed is how you show respect for the people who have to look at you.”

She always wore her lipstick

Always

Bright pink

Coty Brand
Number something something

I used to watch her get ready to go to bed at night
And it was like watching Cleopatra
Or Elizabeth Taylor
Or Vivien Leigh

When I would pick her up for lunch dates
Or trips to the grocery store
She would
Without fail

Climb the stairs to the bathroom
And return
With a signature pink smile

She was afraid of math
Paying bills
Of having to take care of herself
She was a perfect 1950’s housewife

She was solid
In so many ways
And weak in others

And as I try to feel what I should

All I can feel
Is that she died long ago

She gave up
Retreated
Languished

Until the quick slide into eternity

Swallowed everything up

The last time I saw her
I left her house feeling so depressed
At what she had become
At what she had allowed

Maybe I expected too much

As I drove the drive I knew so well

I felt the Lord say to me

“It’s okay. You don’t have to go back. You can just give her to me.’

And so I did

I hope that she felt peace
I hope that she knew
In spite of my absence
That I loved her

That I was grateful

For the ways she had saved me

That I tried to forget

The ways she let me down

Flipping through pictures of better days

I grieve for the words
I wish I could write
The words I want to write

I grieve for what should have been

For the whole family

I should have had

Hug my daughters
A little bit closer

Remember how she folded her napkins
The smell of her hair
The mountains of useless knick knacks
She kept enshrined behind glass

The painting of the ocean

That  I can't stand

But that hangs in my house

Regardless

I remember

How she always reminded me 

Of Lucille Ball

And Betty White

The sorrow gives me pause

While I pack the diaper bag

Without really thinking
I put on my lipstick
Before walking out the door

Dark blood red

On a perfectly crooked pout

Maybe tomorrow
It will even be pink