Love and The Letter

I have a new love.  Two brothers whose music is really not my type at all, in that it was made in the 21st century and not about 40 years earlier.  In that it is a band with a banjo. 
But in love I am, with the Avett Brothers.
Their lyrics are stunningly beautiful and hilarious.
There is one song in particular that I keep replaying on my Ipod and in my head..."Murder in the City".
No, it's not gangsta crap.  In my head I picture a gunslinger in the Old West, singing a song to his family in case of tragedy.  There is a line instructing his family to read a letter, a list he had made for them of "to-do's".  Reminding his loved ones how much he loved them and his gratefulness of sharing his name with them.  That line blew my mind the first time I heard it and I simply love it.

So.  The Letter.
I have been meaning for a long time to write a letter to my grandma, telling her things I could never say in person without bawling like a newborn baby.  Because I am a WUSS.  But, that can't be helped.
So today, with my newly beloved Avett Bros in the background, I wrote her my letter, my list.

I cried the whole way through it.  I told her how much I appreciated her, how I wouldn't have ended up anywhere this side of normal without her, how I can't imagine her pain of losing her daughter and her best friend all at once, how I noticed all she did without to give me everything and I remember all her sayings/rules/superstitions.  And I tell them to my own children all the time.  Most of my best childhood memories are with her.  She represents everything that is safe and sane and warm and welcoming in this world to me.

I have a very different relationship with my grandma than many probably do with their own.  She was my grandma and my mother all in one and that was both a difficult role to assume and accept.  I lived with her every weekend and many summers from the time I was 8 until I was a senior in high school.  Most of my ideas and definitions of what it mean to be a woman, come from her.  She is a lady through and through.  Her "face on", hair done and outfit pressed to perfection before we could even walk to the corner market for a newspaper.  I can count on one hand the number of times I have heard her curse (at worst damn) or lose her patience.  I can only hope for an ounce of her patience and gentle spirit.  Clearly, the ideas I have of being a woman have not translated into my reality so easily.  There is hope.

So I printed the letter with no copy and mailed it today.  I don't need to read it again.  I will have all those words and more with me forever.

And now I am on to find scalped tickets for the Avett Brothers show in April.