Dearest One, Royal Flush, and Telling People You Love Them

Mobile: The Juggler

On giving a genuine compliment

“You didn’t have to say that,” blushed rabbit.

“I know,” crow replied.

Thoughts while making...

“We had 7,000,000 gallons of rain,” she explained. “If this is what El Niño

is going to do, we can do without him.”

My Gramma had a way with words. Over 25 years ago – when she was in her 80s – we wrote each other. And I got to know her – and her humor, her heart – in a way I never had before.

“I had to endure 2 scopings,” she said in one handwritten letter. “One with a scope about the size of a garden hose.’”

“They ran it down my throat to who knows where and kept telling me I wouldn’t feel a thing.”

“Ha! It wasn’t their bodies they were violating,” she exclaimed. “I thought probably everything would leak out and I could die in peace. But they didn’t let me.”

In her letters, she shared everything from her thoughts on death, tacos, and her endless pursuit of the elusive royal flush on a poker machine … with all the coins in.

Every so often, I pull out that stack of letters and rifle through them.

Today was such a day.

“Dearest One,” she would begin - such a gift to read now. Such a gift.

“First, I want you to know that your letter was like a gift from heaven,” she writes. “I felt so awful that week and to realize that someone, especially a grandson, thought I was so wonderful made feel like a queen. It was better than a blood transfusion.”

For much of my childhood, my Gramma scared me. That said, I can’t remember why I started writing her. But I’m so glad I did.

At a time when there is so much hurt and pain and fear and anger swirling around us all, who can you reach out to this week to let them know how special they are to you and why?