Babies & my Granny

Another friend of mine told me today that she is pregnant. I am very excited for my friends N & R (who I met in law school). They have been married for nearly 9 years and are one of the few truly happy married couples I know; I have long thought they had a remarkably stable relationship. They had been trying to conceive for almost a year, so this is very exciting news.

I got an email today from another law school classmate of mine that she had her baby early this morning. I know of at least two other law school classmates who are having babies before the end of this year, and my friend KK from college is pregnant with her third baby.

All these little babies! Honestly, any time someone who is a functional member of society wants to bring a new life into the world, I'm all for it. I'm happy for my friends.

Today would have been my paternal grandmother's 104th birthday. She passed away in 1988, so she's been gone for almost 19 years. "Granny" will always be very special to me; even after all this time, there is still hardly a day that goes by that I don't think of her. She came from Ireland to live with us when I was one-year-old; after my parents' divorce, she was really more like a mother to my sister and me than our actual mother. (We lived with my dad post-divorce and only saw my mom two or three times a month.)

Granny was very loving, but also strict. She was a devout Catholic who prayed the rosary daily. . . and sometimes became a little impatient with my "American" way of questioning our faith. Granny often said that she only ever had one boyfriend--her husband. Granny devoted her life to taking care of her family; she actually enjoyed "keeping house" and cooking. I came home from school every day to her home-baked brown bread; she preferred to make our beds herself, as we didn't do them up to her standards (to this day, I find it hard to remember to make my own bed!).

Granny was Irish to the core; aside from one year of living in New York right before the Great Depression, she only came to the U.S. to live at age 69. She had a lovely brogue and thought that Ireland was "a little bit of heaven that fell from the sky." She told us wonderful stories about leprechauns and distant ancestors.

Most of my best childhood memories involve Granny in some way; I was very blessed to grow up with her.

I love you still, Granny! I know that you are in heaven, praying for me.