Over the years, I've talked about my grandparents on this blog a few times. What this account has seen from me is staggering, and also varied. My grandpa from my dad's side passed away when I was in middle school, and my grandma joined him after my sophomore year of college. On the other side, my mom's parents are still trucking along, and that is the source of this tale.
They live in southern Georgia because they retired there in the '80s, so my attachment to them is there but not super tight. It's hard to stay connected with people you see once every few years, and my most recent visit to them (spring break) came after seven years. This trip came about because we needed to move them out of their house and into a...not assisted living. Senior living. I call it "dorms for old people" because that's essentially what it is. Regardless, they weren't able to keep up with their house, and we were responsible for getting them out and finding a new place for them.
Spring break proved to be a huge waste of time for me, as we didn't actually do anything in terms of getting them out. We found an establishment for them to live at, yes - so I suppose that means huge progress was made over break. I instead got to writhe around on my 3DS playing my borrowed copy of Samurai Warriors Chronicles with about an hour of wi-fi a night, wishing I was at home and working on stuff for my 10 week portfolio review. But anyway.
Mom has been down there three times now this year, Dad twice. They went down this past week to pack stuff up, move stuff out, get stuff donated off, and most importantly, get my grandparents into their new apartment. And from what I hear, it's been the most exhausting pain in the ass ever.
It's stubbornness, basically, and mostly from my grandpa, who is a stubborn old fart. He turned 89 this past week, Grandma 90 when I was there over spring break, and dealing with him as an old man is just a pain. Apparently at one point, he stayed at the house on what little furniture was left while my parents and Grandma did stuff at the apartment.
I understand what people mean when they say stuff like "well their house is full of memories". There's a difference, though, between your retirement house and a place you raised a family in. My dad's parents, for instance, lived in the same house for their whole marriage, so my Grandma refusing to leave makes sense. This set of grandparents, though? They've only been there since retirement, and visits from family are so few that their fondest memories are probably tied to baseball games they watched. So I don't think it's the "memories" aspect, just perhaps the view that moving into senior living is finally giving in to being old.
It's been a struggle, and very hard on my mom in particular because she and I share the tendency of "leading projects because no one else well and then getting blamed for stuff because even though nobody else volunteered to lead they want to complain anyway". See: me and senior project this semester (I'll rant on that later).
Though I guess in the end, it is finally all at least coming to an end. All I know is that my parents have already said they can't wait to get into a place like where my g-parents are now. That'll make my life easier when the time comes.
