Two grandparents, two parents, and two kids, all living under one roof — in perfect harmony? I’m in awe. This bunch could be the model for a contemporary version of The Waltons. They even have a name for their communal arrangement: Project for Intergenerational Living — or PIGL, as they jokingly call it. They have PIGL meetings, PIGL systems, and even a master PIGL schedule.
Continue reading this on Grandparents.com….
The transition from being Nonna on the spot to Nonna faraway gets me every time. It makes me remember how I felt when my ex came to pick up my son and take him to his house for the week. I’d put on a cheerful face, but as soon as they were out the door, I’d burst into tears. I couldn’t help myself. After a while, maybe an hour or a day, I’d get used to being on my own and adjust to the new normal.
Like many boomer nanas, Elizabeth Berg could hardly wait to join the Grandma Club—or Royal Family—as she explains in this excerpt from her delightful essay in Eye of My Heart.
Three days ago, though, I was in Paris with my two young granddaughters, Isabelle, almost 5, and Azalia, 2 next week. We went to a playground near their apartment, then slurped up chocolate ice cream cones. Messy as the outing was, I would trade the drippy, sugary reality of these two little girls for the two-dimensional version we saw of each other yesterday on Skype. In a heartbeat.
Sometimes grandmothers offer advice that is meant to be helpful but is heard as critical and insensitive, as Anne Roiphe adroitly explains in this powerful excerpt from her essay in Eye of My Heart.
So, The New York Times informs us, Goldie Hawn is Glam-Ma and Blythe Danner is Lalo. (Danner lobbied for Woof, but her granddaughter, Apple—Gwyneth Paltrow’scherub—had other ideas.) The Times piece also mentions a pack of eight grandparents,not uncommon in these days of spiralling divorce, that includes a Q and a Buya Buya—perhaps the most spot-on description of what grandparents actually do.
“Resistant to being called anything that makes them sound old,” the article tells us, “baby-boomer grandparents have taken to accepting toddlers’ neologisms and ethnicvariations or, better yet, naming themselves.”
Ok, so I realize I’ve kvetched about being a long-distance grandmother. I’ve wept over the fact that I can’t spontaneously pick Isabelle up at school or spend the morning playing princess with Azalia. Sad. True. On the bright side, when I do go to visit, I don’t wind up in Nowhere, North Dakota. (Apologies to North Dakotans: I’m sure you’re state is lovely.) I go to Paris (not Paris, Texas, the other one). I play with the girls in the Jardin du Luxembourg. We eat Berthillon ice cream and watch the boats go by on the Seine. I’m leaving Sunday for two weeks and am totally psyched–to get my hands on those two little girls, under Paris skies, which stay light until about 11 p.m. as we approach the solstice. Stay tuned for more from the Ile de France!
Grandmothers are by definition grownups. We know that our grandchildren are capable of loving all their grandparents. But occasionally we have spontaneous, embarassing flashbacks to junior high school, as Judith Viorst hilariously describes in this excerpt from her essay “The Rivals” in Eye of My Heart.
I recently came across this charming blog post by my friend Melinda Blau, and it reminded me of how much in the dark most grandmothers are before our first grandchild is born. And then we see him—or her—and the heart leaps and keeps on leaping.
