Granny Teddy

The Smith Family said good-bye to its matriarch this week when we buried and celebrated the life of Granny Teddy Smith. She was a wonderful woman who will be missed terribly by all who knew her, and she was a model wife, mother, daughter, sister... well. You name it, she did it right.

Things I learned about Granny this weekend I never knew: no one heard her ever say a bad word about anyone else. Think about that. I'd like to think that I love everyone and treat everyone real nice and everything, but no one can ever say they've never heard me talk smack about someone (especially idiots on TV because I don't know them and can judge them the live-long day).

I knew she was a nurse and she met her husband George when he was a resident doctor, but I never knew that he was a ladies man with a sting a' girls lined up. He cancelled all his superfluous dates after one evening with Granny. Whoo-whoo-whoo!

Granny paid for one of the first dates Tommy and I went on - when he took me home for the first time to meet his folks, he took me to tour the Jack Daniels distillery in nearby Lynchburg, Tenn. (That was free, hold on - I'm getting to it) and Granny paid for us to have lunch at Miss Bobo's Boardinghouse. That was fun.

I wear her wedding stones in my own wedding and engagement rings. (sidebar: Tommy and I were the first of our friends to get married and we didn't really know all the odds and ends that go into it. As in, we forgot wedding rings. Fortunately someone thought to ask about a week before the ceremony and we ordered a couple and we were so late they were delivered to the church the day of our wedding. I HATED mine. But I didn't say anything and on my first anniversary had the stones reset into a setting I liked better. Haha!) I still think of the stones as hers and would want the rings to go back to the Smiths if anything ever happened to me.

Pictures were everywhere as you may imagine, and I was given permission to take what I wanted to blog about. I gathered ones that impressed me and started to think about what I would say about Granny that I never knew. I realized I'd taken all photos of her and her girlfriends having fun. None of her and her husband, or her and her family or even ones of her and my husband - all ones of her cutting up with her friends. On Tuesday when I left, I was really surprised to hear my sister-in-law, (Teddy, named after Granny) who grew up living next to Granny, comment on how she never knew Granny had such whacky fun with her lady friends. Allow me to present to you:

granny teddy. she's in the middle.

she liked swimming, just like me! she's second from the left.

and she liked being silly, just like me...

and she's a fan of the crazy photo too... she was awesome, ya'll. she's fourth from the left giving you the stank eyes...

Old family videos were brought out too. Please take a peek at:

my punk-ass beloved, tommy smith

I have tried on occasion to tell about this one video to some of our friends, and on this trip, I made a crappy copy of this on my camera. This is Tommy's sister, Teddy showing off for the camera her tap dance routine. Unfortunately, and unbeknownst to her, Tommy and their cousin Matt decide to punk her and spoil her dance. I keep laughing so the video is shaky, but ya'll... it's comedy gold.

It was Easter too, and Hampton left this for the ole' EB:

eb left him a note back saying yes he may have some peeps, but unfortunately ants got in them overnight. hampton ate them anyway (i would have too)

For those of you who are unfamiliar with how a funeral goes in the south, allow me to share: you eat. And eat. And eat. And eat. But you don't cook - food just magically shows up, dropped off by church fairies. Copious amounts of food - and not nice, healthy food either; no sir. Calorie, fat and salt/sugar-laden yumminess shows up to help you cope with your misery. I think I gained ten pounds, but I ain't complainin'.... Although I will say this: I was polishing off a bag of chips (it seriously wasn't that much for those who know me; not much more than a serving, no joke) and no less than three people reminded me how many calories were in a serving of chips. HOWEVER, when I ate two solid pieces of dessert after lunch hours earlier... no one said a thing (one piece strawberry pie, one pecan).

food table

dessert table

There surprisingly is an upside to funerals:

you get to visit with family you rarely see. granny teddy's children live in california, florida and washington, dc so getting everyone in the room at the same time does take some doin'

On Monday several of the cousins decided to take a road trip. I mentioned earlier they were close to Lynchburg, home of the Jack Daniel's distillery where Tommy took us on one of our first dates, soooo.....

we loaded up the truck and we moved to beverly!

tommy, sara, tim and lexie learn how to make whiskey

while i practice chugging it...

me and the bus - self-photo!

our tour guide, ron, and the tour group in the cave spring. he said that spelunkers were ONE MILE up into the cave spring. what the hizzy? i think they drank too much whiskey and decided that would be a good idea.

tim, sara, my buddy mr. daniels, moi, tommy, lexie and dylan

tommy and i both bought jack daniel's tees, and unwittingly we were twinkies on my last day in winchester

we don't mind so much

i left tommy in the chester to visit with family and came home to THIS. i thought he was an ex-salamander, and left him for mr. smith to take care of, but everytime i'd come into the laundry room... he'd... moved. tommy finally got home the next day and took care of him. i think he's an ex-salamander now...

I enjoyed visiting with family and I loved being part of Granny's life. At her funeral, mother-in-law Suzy said that Granny had told Lexie the first thing that she was going to do when she got to heaven was dance with her husband, George. I would also like to think that she'd start a supper club and invite my grannies to be part of it, and maybe teach them how to play bridge. She was the last of Tommy and my grannies to go, so it's particularly a punch for us, and certainly the end of an era. But on the other hand, I sure am lucky that I had growing up two incredible grannies of my own to look up to, and gained another two incredible ladies when Mr. Smith and I married. I was well into my 20s before I lost my first grandmother so I sure had plenty of time to know and love them both as well as my two grannys-in-law.

In order to avoid a sad ending, allow me to tell you my next blog post will be about a conference I'm attending on Saturday! Oh dear... that sounds like a nerdy ending now... Um.. OH! How about I end with the fact that my purple toe nail is almost grown out! Sorry... I know that's pathetic, but it's all I got right now.

Over and out, peeps.