Did your Grandparents love you?

I did not get to know my Paternal Grandparents as they passed on before or when I was very little.

My Maternal Grandparents loved me very much.

They were born in 1898 and 1899 and were Farmers in Deep East Texas all their lives.

From as early as I can remember I spent afew weeks with them each summer for many years and also we would go and visit them alot. Great memories ! I remember my Grandfather plowing the fields with Mules.
They lived off the land and afew Cattle and Chickens.
They had a Vegetable Stand out front of the entrance to the Farm and would sell to folks who were traveling. I remember working the Stand and the money was in a old Cigar Box.

Fishing in creeks with Cane Poles and worms we dug up or grasshoppers for bait, and hunting. Whatever we caught or killed, my Grandmother would cook it up.
Breakfast was fantastic - biscuits and Blackburn Syrup, piles of Eggs and Bacon, black coffee.
I remember my Grandfather grabbing a couple of chickens and chopping the heads off for Granna to fry up for dinners.
We would try ride the young cows and get bucked right off - ha !
Hauling square bail hay and working the crops in the fields.

They never had Air Conditioning. All they had was a Swamp Cooler and in hot / humid East Texas the Swamp Coolers don't do much ! I remember the hot nights and the sheets stuck to you... ha !

I am glad that I got to see and experience the Farm Life a little bit.

My Grandfather passed when I was 14 and my Grandmother told me that she wished she could give the Farm to me as they knew how much I loved it.
Sadly, the farm was sold.

About 25 or 30 year later, after I was working in the Oil Fields and we had some monies saved up, ms gamboolgal and I went to the old Farm place and talked to the old widow woman living there. She let us look the place over and I told stories of the memories to ms gamboolgal.
But the widow was not interesting in selling.

I often wondered how life would have been had I been abit older and able to take on the Farm vs working 43 year in the Oil Patch...

Lifes A Dance And You Learn As You Go....
 

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My grandparents owned a two flat in Chicago, and my family rented the downstairs flat. I was free to run up and down the stairs so my grandparents were to me just part of my family. I got along well with them, and they liked me, but in later years, my parents confided that there was a lot of conflict between upstairs and downstairs. My grandmother apparently said some horrible things about my mother, which was hard to believe, because I never saw any conflict between them. Besides that my mother was an angel. I can't find a better word to describe such a wonderful person than my mother.

While my grandmother loved me, she was a far out there fundamentalist Christian, who taught me I was going to Hell, and there was no getting around it. When you love someone, it is easy for them to damage you, especially in the formative years. My father was a pathetic man, and my grandfather was an alcoholic. For all the love I thought I experienced, I came from a very dysfunctional family. Sometimes I've wondered how I managed to survive, and I actually envy friends who came from more normal homes. Well, surviving is easy. That's what most of people I observe do. But becoming a better person takes actual work.
 
Sassycakes said:
My Dad's parents hated my Mom, Me, My Sister, and my Brother. Even though they hated us my Mom insisted we visit them every week. She didn't want my Dad not to see his parents. None of our cousins were even allowed to talk to us. My Mom's Mother passed away when I was 5yrs old and she had been bedridden all my life. I was close to my Mom's Dad until he was in his 90's and got lost. Search party after search party trying to find him for a month when finally a young boy tripped over my Grandfathers body. Now that I am a grandparent I am very close to my grandchildren.I would never want them to go through what I did.
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My momā€™s mother died young from MS so I never met her. My other grandmother I only met once and my mom didnā€™t like her.
Did she love me? I donā€™t really know. Maybe as best as she could.
 
My maternal grandmother adored me. We had the best relationship always. I missed her so much after she died it was hard to move forward from the loss of that kind of love. Paternal grandmother loved me too but paternal granddad didn't, really. I got along much better with mom's side of the family in some ways. There was always a lot of death in my family from the time I was 9 years old and paternal grandpa died. Someone was always dying, and coping with loss like that when you're a kid is tough. It shakes your foundation.
:(
 
I never knew my Maternal grandparents. My Paternal grandfather was born on the second official Groundhog Day (February 2, 1888), and died in December of 1947, when I was three and a half years old. I like to think he loved me!

My Paternal grandmother took us to Sunday School and church. She was the Sunday School Superintendent, and led the singing during the opening each week. We walked to church. She called me Jimmy Art, and addressed cards to me, with Jamie. She lived to the ripe old age of 86, and loved all of us kids dearly. I still think of her when I hear those old hymns.
 
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My maternal grandfather in Japan used to exchange letters. I don't know why, but, my sisters didn't write to him. His English was excellent, though he always apologized for it. He was a Principal or Dean of a school. We, unfortunately never did meet. Grandmother was a curmudgeon, always complaining.

Paternal grandfather was a happy drunk. All I can say, is, he was nice to me. Didn't really have much communication. Grandmother, who was apparently very nice, was deceased when I met Grandpa.
 
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The last time I say my paternal grandmother was at a family reunion in the early 1990s. One of her sons brought her from the nursing home to attend what would be her last family reunion, as she was in her 90s. I was in my late 40s at the time. I walked over to pay my respects, and her son told her "this is Buckeye, *****'s youngest son". She just looked at me and said "you always were a pretty boy."

So yes, I always felt love from all my grandparents.
 
Out of 12 relatives... Aye! I'm the 13th and lucky for it... The people who loved me were, my beloved Papa, maternal grandfather and paternal grandmother and my maternal granduncle.

They were in my life for the shortest time...
Granduncle 1966
Maternal grandfather 1969
Papa 1974

Paternal grandmother 1993 -- I spent two marvellous years with paternal grandmother Snow, which I cherished still. I was told by auntie Queeny, that before she died she told Queeny how happy she'd been those two years in that horrible OAP/Seniors retreat as I'd been the only grandchild who'd visited her during that time.

No children nor great-grandchildren visited her and that was something that made her very happy. I felt blessed! She gave up on life a fortnight before her 100th birthday. She'd lost too many children and died of a broken šŸ’”šŸ˜­.

On the day of her funeral, I was given my honourary name of "White Feather".
 
You bet. I have very fond memories. :)

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I'm afraid not. Both grandfathers checked out before I came onto the scene, one grandmother thought that I was a nuisance and told me so and the other grandmother emphatically favored my cousins, the children of my mother's sister. I did grow up 9 time zones away from them though.......so our acquaintance was intermittent and I was a bit of a stranger to them.
 
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My dad's mother died before I was born. I do remember his father well. He was a gentle man with large strong hands, a solid head of curly gray hair, and a smile that would melt anyone's heart. He died when I was 5 years old and even at that age, I mourned his passing. My mom's parents were alive well into my married life. They were loving, fun, people and loved us very much. I still miss them! I spend time with them during the summers for a couple of weeks once I was around 10 years old. I could not wait to travel to Denver and spend my summertime with them. All good memories...

I actually had one set of Great Grand Parents, living in Idaho Springs, Colorado until I was 11 years old. They too were gentle loving soles. I have wonderful memories of visiting them and watching Grandma cooking on their wood fired black metal stove. That women could cook....! Poppy, my Great Grand Father smoked cigars, outside of course, and was a great story teller. He would set down with us and start telling us stories about his childhood. Some were a bit, enhanced, but all the better. They both lived into their 90's and past within a few months of each other.
RIP, they were very special...
 
I don't think it ever even entered any (or most) of my grandparents' heads that they were supposed to love their grandkids; of all four of them, we're talking poor farmers of whom the women clung to religion since life was so hard and the men were of the firm opinion that life's a b*tch and then you die and then you no longer exist so why even bother with love of any kind.
 
I'm kind of surprised to see so many people whose Grandparents didn't care for them. I guess I'm lucky. I last saw my maternal grandparents when I was 9. Grampa was a blacksmith and he let me pump his forge. There was a family get together and Grampa did a clog dance. Sweet memories. My paternal grandparents were farmers. Grandma immigrated from Switzerland as a child. She made great sauerkraut and wonderful bread. The last time we said goodbye there were tears in her eyes. They were all fine people.
 
Paternal grandmother died before I was even a spark in my father's eye.

I knew my maternal grandmother,,, guess she & I got along.
When I was a teen she hinted that she would like me to go to the Catholic church.

Told her I was reading Bible every night. That ended the hints.

Since my paternal grandfather lived with us ,,,, he was my best friend.
He died when I was 18. šŸ„²
 
The only grandparent I got to know was my father's father. (The others had passed on) He lived with us until he died when I was ten. The word "love" was not mentioned in our house and hugs hadn't yet been invented. But he would sing a song, if not to us, at least in our presence. He would take us, the three youngest grandchildren for a day at Coney Island or the Bronx Zoo when he was in his eighties. That was special.
 

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