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    Grandparents: Volume 2- It Don't Come Easy: The "Grandparents" Series, #2
    Grandparents: Volume 2- It Don't Come Easy: The "Grandparents" Series, #2
    Grandparents: Volume 2- It Don't Come Easy: The "Grandparents" Series, #2
    Ebook263 pages1 hour

    Grandparents: Volume 2- It Don't Come Easy: The "Grandparents" Series, #2

    By j.i.m. lord

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Reading Grandparents: Volume 2 - IT DON'T COME EASY, before reading "Grandparents: Purpose", is pointless.

    If you wish to consider knowing about
    what it is like to raise three grandkids after their mother passes, read both volumes.

    We make do. Aren't you just a little bit curious how? 

    And if reading a story that is real, that states what everyday life is like with four generations beneath one roof, this telling just may be for you.

    But if you are a reader who thrives on the weird, the bizarre,the fantastical, the UN-real, just move on...please. This is not fiction.

    LanguageEnglish
    Publisherj.i.m. lord
    Release dateJan 5, 2016
    ISBN9781483531175
    Grandparents: Volume 2- It Don't Come Easy: The "Grandparents" Series, #2
    Author

    j.i.m. lord

    J.I.M. Lord is the father of three and grandfather of three, of which the three grandkids have been adopted by Jim and his wife Emily after the death of their daughter. Jim & family live in Oklahoma and are on a first-name-basis with the ins and outs of food stamps, WIC, government housing, and the struggles to make ends meet by frequenting garage sales and re-selling those "gems" on Ebay...thus the lead character's name in "Finding My Way Back Home:"  JOBE!  Look for Jim's novels "Grandparents: Purpose" & "Grandparents: It Don't Come Easy" , memoirs of life in the "starting over" lane of parenting grandkids!

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      Book preview

      Grandparents - j.i.m. lord

      by the author of  GRANDPARENTS: Purpose

      This which follows is to the perhaps millions of us out there who are

      dealing with the horrifying fact that we have outlived one of our children.

      There may be more of us, but I don’t know if anyone is keeping tabs on

      the actual count. Is there a statistic somewhere?  A list? Perhaps. I just know

      one thing is for certain: There is no one on the face of the earth who wants

      to be on this particular list. We are, and the fact that we are hurts like hell.

      We’re on a bunch of lists, only one of which is more sorrowful than

      the one previously mentioned: Parents who have outlived two or more children.

      Other lists we’re on? We are grandparents who’ve adopted our grandkids. We are

      caring, in-house, for an elderly and demanding great-grandmother. We are poor.

      We’re baby boomers and, like some baby boomers, we don’t like what we are

      finding at the end of this so-called rainbow. You see, we’re all members of some

      kind of list, whether it be a good list, bad list, in-between list, or what should be the

      most damning list of all: Has outlived one or more children. Uh huh, we’re on this

      one as well. Check.

      IN LOVING MEMORY OF CHARLIE & CARLIE

      1

      ––––––––

      January 2014

      Well, we know how we got here, now what?

      To refresh your memory, we adopted the three grandkids a few

      years ago, and by the time you read this, if anybody happens to

      take such an initiative, the kids will be 12, 9, and 6. Kate, our youngest,

      and only living child, will be 19. Then there is Marilyn, my 80

      year old mother. My wife of all these years is Fran. My name is J.I.M.

      You can call me Jim. Is this house getting smaller or is it just me? 

      I could hear them in there, Sis and Marilyn, back there in the boys’ old

      bedroom. I walked back that way and sneaked a peek. Marilyn continued to

      yell, Stop, stop! 

      2

      ––––––––

      And there they were, with Marilyn in her wheelchair and Sis behind

      her, spinning the chair for all she was worth. I had to compose myself

      before deciding to go in there or not. Funny thing about it, Sis had this look

      on her face. Couldn’t explain it, then it became all-too clear. "You gonna

      stop being so mean to my Papa?"

      "I’m not mean to your Papa, now stop spinning me!" Sis stopped. She

      let go of Marilyn’s chair and left the room.       

      Sis saw me in the hallway, and I could swear that five year old kid

      winked at me as she passed by. I was right behind her. I wasn’t in the

      mood to hear Marilyn go off, again, in reference to how out of control the

      grandkids are.

      Marilyn isn’t really mean to us, but when she does get into one

      of her moods, we all kind of just blow it off to her age and the frustration

      she’s feeling. Frustration, as in how she’s not allowed to go to the casinos

      3

      ––––––––

      any more. This, and for another simple fact that we’ve got her down to five

      cigarettes a day. And believe me, she is real careful about how she picks

      and chooses her spots. Sometimes she’ll choose to smoke all five at once.

      I suppose there’s some kind of vindictiveness in her actions when she

      smokes all five at once. Other times, she’ll ask for one, then a minute later

      ask for a second one. Fine, but I am keeping count.

      The other day, an old high school friend of Marilyn’s stopped

      by for a visit. Funny thing, her friend, I’ll call her Gloria, insisted on not

      getting out of her car, but instead asked if Marilyn could sit in the car

      with her. She said something about having the gout. Okay, but I didn’t just

      fall off the stupid wagon, so I watched them from the garage door window.

      Please don’t let anybody ever tell you two old ladies can’t be sneaky when

      the itch strikes them. Very sneaky, but not as sneaky as me.

      I saw everything. Marilyn smoked four cigarettes in about twenty

      4

      minutes. Then, between smokes, I saw her take a bottle of pills from Gloria

      and stash them in her pajama pocket. Okay, I had to stand on a five

      gallon bucket to actually see through the window... but I did see it... with

      my own two (very feeble) eyes. Then it struck me, this is how she was

      getting pills when she was at the hospital, then later at the nursing home.

      It’s all pretty clear to me now. And guess who her main visitor was at both

      rehab facilities? Good guess. Yep, ol’ Gloria, the friend since childhood.

      I heard Gloria honk the horn. I went out and helped my mother back

      inside, and then into her room.

      I bided my time, even asked her how the visit went, etc., then waited

      for her to fall  asleep. While she was asleep, I checked her shirt (pajamas)

      pocket. Nothing. Hmm. I knew she couldn’t have gotten very far, her stash

      has to be in here somewhere. I found it, among other things, in about a

      5

      minute. Between the mattress and boxspring.

      Insert wake up call here. Yes, what I found beneath that mattress

      would have made swoon any black marketeer going. Let me see,

      where to start? Well, to begin with, there were four packs of cigarettes,

      seven bottles of various sundries (read uppers, downers, and in-

      betweeners.) I had to force myself not to flip out. And, yes, she

      can sleep through a tornado, so I wasn’t worried about waking her.

      Even more startling was the fact that she had actually ripped a hole

      through the box spring and was apparently storing up for a nuclear winter.

      I dunno, but that assumption seems reasonable.

      It took me a few days to fully comprehend what I had discovered

      6

      beneath that woman’s mattress. And I thought I was sneaky as a kid with

      what I used to hide beneath my mattress. And no, I won’t get into that little

      confession right at this time, except to say, no, it wasn’t dirty magazines. I

      think.

      I told Fran and she laughed. Fran gave her credit. My wife just wanted

      to know one thing: Did I find matches or a lighter? I did not. Thankfully,

      or Fran would have flipped. She’s very, very careful about matches and

      lighters.

      So, continuing, I was pretty upset thinking how Gloria had been

      playing me for the fool these past few years. Among other items, I found

      four tubes of the infamous Preparation H (my god, she’s hoarding Prep H);

      7

      three candy bars left over from last Halloween, and I bet two full boxes of

      Kleenex (sans the boxes)...oh, there’s more. I had to reach way into that

      box spring combo: supermarket slash pharmacy, and I just kept finding

      stuff. Lemmee see: in no particular order: silverware, not the plastic kind;

      Tylenol, two tubes of baby-type Vaseline (she must have swiped these

      when Sis was still in diapers); three tubes of Orajel (I’ll give her this one,

      she did have bad teeth for the longest time, til I hooked her up with our

      dentist); four little packages of Chapstick (unopened); assorted cheese

      crackers, one can of mixed nuts...well, you get the idea. Oh, and another

      item: a pint of Apricot Brandy, half-empty. Okay, my mom is a closet

      drinker, but I can live with it, as long as she isn’t asking me if she can drive

      the pickup. (Update: Just now, 5/16/14, she asked to drive the pickup...

      My head is spinning. She wants to drive up home for Memorial Day!!

      This, after 3 strokes, breast cancer, lung cancer, etc. I said no.)

      There had to be, approximately, fifteen to twenty more items in that

      8

      boxspring, so I imagine you’re thinking right now: So, what’d you do with

      all that stuff? Simple. I put it all back, even the pills. The med bottles were

      all full, right to the top, so I assumed, probably correctly I might add, that

      she can’t get the childproof/adult proof caps off them...and she knows

      better’n to ask one of the kids to pop a top, so the pills stayed. It just makes

      me mad... hell, those pills she was mixing back at the nursing home could

      have killed her.....and I don’t dare say anything to Gloria. Nope, if I did,

      those two might come up with some new scheme that really could harm

      Marilyn. But, I just can’t forget those times she was hauled off to the

      hospital after she’d

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