Sanctuary

Too much down time is never a good thing. I think too much, but not productive thinking--my thoughts just circle morbidly around dreadful topics. I found myself spiraling in that direction today and decided to claim sanctuary in the form of my grandparents' house. I called to see if they were home and was immediately invited to dinner. You can't pass up free food, so I went.

When I spend time away from them, I forget how wonderful my grandparents are. My grandfather got his PhD in education (I want to say from Oklahoma, but I could be wrong) and then did his post-doc at UC-Berkley in the 60s. My grandmother was--and I think, is--incredibly beautiful. The only problem was that once they settled in Utah Valley, my grandmother refused to move again. And Utah Valley didn't appreciate my grandfather's progressive (and at times political) views of education, which limited him to teaching math and being a principal and a school counselor. Limited is the wrong word because when you hear his students talk about him, he gave a lot of them a fresh outlook on life, a view that took them out of Utah Valley. But in his mind, he's a failure. In both of their minds, my grandparents are just silly old people living out their lives. They never see how wonderful they are. And because of that, many of their children and grandchildren don't see how wonderful they are.

Tonight we had dinner and talked for a while. (My grandfather informing me that (1) I don't need to rush into marriage and (2) if I'm wondering about any "fat little boy," I just need to bring him around and my grandfather can tell me if the flb is a keeper or not.) I mentioned leaving and received two "Don't leave yet"s. It was kind of nice to be wanted, so I stuck around playing with the toy train. I lay down on my stomach so that I could see the cars as they went behind the Christmas tree. I think Grandma forgot that I could hear (and that I'm 22); she was pointing out how cute I was to Grandpa.

I am cute. And now I'm going to take my cute little self into my room to read a book. Good night.