Maxine

Wow. It's been a while since I touched this thing - I'm so sorry to all my "faithful readers" (because there are so many of you - HA!)

Sorry this is going to be on such a somber (and long) note, but hopefully this will be the start of me updating this thing more regularly again.

This is really weird for me. I have now lost the first of what are sure to be many important people in my life. One of the closest people I had is now gone, and it's really hard to grasp. Perhaps the best I can do is to sit here and write this through the tears that flow down my face - a small tribute to the woman that I loved so much:


Maxine died tonight.

Who the heck is Maxine, you ask? You know - Maxine. Maxine Kendall. Ok, she's actually Nanny's cousin. My "adopted grandma." Perhaps it is a little weird for me to first of all even know my grandmother's cousin, and second of all to even care that she is now gone, but Maxine was not ordinary by any stretch of the imagination, to me, or to anyone else whose life she touched. My mom always jokes that my sister and I were what cleaned up Maxine's act. She was a little "rough around the edges" to put it mildly - she always was, but that was what made Maxine, Maxine. Enter us children, and enter a less colorful vocabulary, a newfound vigor for life and an all around shift in attitude.

Maxine lived in my hometown. Her husband was long since dead by the time I was in the picture and she was never able to have any children of her own. Perhaps this is why my mother and uncle, and later, my sister and I were so important to her. We truly were like her own children and grandchildren. Mom, Katie and I used to go visit her house on a fairly regular basis. I was always eager to go. You see, Maxine was a constant source of laughter, goodies (of the baked nature) and of course - cats. To call Maxine a cat lover would be an understatement. She always had at least one and I loved to go visit her menagerie, eat a slice of her famous lemon pound cake, and to watch her old Lava lamp.

Maxine had one of the original Lava lamps, it stood like a golden spire on one the bottom shelves of an old end table and it was always the first thing I would do upon arriving at her house - run over to the electrical cord that sprung forth from it's bottom and turn the small rotary switch with my chubby and less than nimble fingers. It was a glorious sight to behold as the shiny red wax began to shoot forth long and intricate tendrils from its core. To my wondering eyes, it was truly fascinating. (it wasn't until years later that I learned that the Lava in the lamp actually completely melts and bubbles through the surrounding liquid!) And as I sat there I would eat one (or five) of the round orange, yellow and pink sugar free candies she had (Maxine was diabetic) that were somehow appealing to me - probably because someone told me I wouldn't like them.

Maxine is single handedly responsible for the downfall of my family's pet history. Until Maxine decided that Katie and I needed some pet fish we were perfectly content visiting the cats at her house and the bird at Nanny's. But we were destined for fish, and they arrived in the form of a beautiful octagonal tank, complete with working pump, natural "colored" pebbles, and "realistic" greenery. The fish were small, one elegantly finned black (we named Blacky - how original!) and one rainbow-striped. Both short lived and both replaced several times. A half a dozen matchboxes, trowel digs and mini-funeral services later, we eventually abandoned the idea of the fish and moved onto cats, and later a dog. Maxine was there, every step of the way, offering advice, assistance or support as we lost one, and then all of them to wild animals or old age.

Maxine was 94 when she died earlier today, and up until the past three or four years, you never would have guessed her age. It got to be a running joke with the church friends and "shut-ins" she went to visit. The "old folks" she would call them, people who in many cases were ten or even fifteen years younger than her, yet she was the one who would go and do things for them. She had a true servant's heart and enjoyed little else more than helping others in one capacity or another.

I'd be negligent to not mention Maxine's incredible sense of humor. Dry and sarcastic, she was never one to be flippant with words. Her laughter would warm the dreariest of rooms on the coldest of days and her incessant pestering were a staple of family gatherings. There was the time when she and Nanny were about to embark on a journey to Hawaii with the senior adults from church. As a joke, my mom gave them both a rather small bikini to "wear" on their trip. The laughter still rings in my ears from her reaction. There are countless Christmas mornings where Maxine would be right alongside the rest of our family as Katie and I emerged from our bedrooms to see what Santa had left us. She was always eager to see our faces and to share in the joy and excitement and to deliver the often random gifts she would find for us in her travels, or through mail order catalogs. And she was there to help Nanny and I when my sister was sick in the hospital for several months and my parents had to stay in Dallas for days and even weeks at a time.

Eventually Maxine decided to sell her house and move into an apartment complex where several of her friends also lived. With the move came a garage sale and for me, a ten year old, the chance of a lifetime. Maxine let Katie and I go through the tables upon tables of "junk" and take anything we wanted. Among the gosh awful glued together miniature sandcastle, the odd tall, thin wooden pig statue and other goodies, was the stuffed sandbag frog that Maxine had made years before out of some flower print and turquoise corduroy. It was and is nothing special, but as it sits in my parent's house it is special for some odd reason. Probably because Maxine made it and because it was always there in my childhood visits. In a similar way, the ceramics that Maxine started painting over the past 3 or 4 years, after she moved into a retirement complex, are a treasure to me. Maxine gave to me the intricately painted cowboy Santa, the piece that undoubtedly required the most amount of time and work, particularly for her gnarled and arthritic hands. I cherish that little knick-knack, not because it is outrageously gorgeous, but because she made it - and because she made it just for me. I know that I am blessed in so many ways, but I guess I am lucky, too. Most people don't ever hang the moon, but I was lucky enough to hang it for two people - Nanny and Maxine. Now that Maxine is gone I cling to the other who still holds me in that regard, yet I see her slipping away as well. Perhaps that is part of what makes this journey so hard. Because I know that all too soon it will be my own grandmother who I will be writing about. Another person who made an impact so deep on my life that it can never be grasped or understood by someone else, or for that matter by me.

I got to see Maxine for the last time over Christmas break this year, and I am so thankful that I did. To see her face light up, even if only for a moment as she opened the hideous dancing flamingo my mother found for her, or to hear her harass Dad for some snide remark he made and especially to hear her talk about how bad Nanny is, and how much it hurt her to see Nanny that way was truly precious to me. After all was said and done, even as she herself was in miserable pain for most hours of her days, she was still looking out for others. How in the world can someone be so selfless? I can't understand it, but I thank her and God for the example she set for me. As Dad and our friend from church visited Maxine this afternoon she told them she could hear the angels singing. I know without a doubt that she is now in a better place and too, that she did hear that glorious sound - a small glimpse of the heaven where she now resides. As Mom said a few hours ago on the phone: “Maxine probably got to heaven and the gates with St. Peter and said ‘Peter, where the hell have you been?!”

Maxine, if you can take just a moment to hear me, let me say thank you. Thank you for the wonderful memories I shared here, and the so many more that I have neither room to write about nor time to share. Thank you for your hilarious, though sometimes dry jokes and sense of humor. Thank you for loving me unconditionally. Thank you for your pound cake recipe, your apple cakes each Christmas, your zany gifts, your hand painted ceramics. Thank you for calling the squirrels that ate all the electric wiring out of your car “the little bastards.” Thank you for being there for Nanny and for all of us. Thank you for teaching me so much about serving and loving and giving away even more than you get. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your laugh, your smile. Thank you for being you. Maxine, I love you.