My blanket doesn't smell like home anymore

Since I was a little girl, there was always a yellow blanket at my grandmother's house that I loved. She knitted it herself, and the spaces between the threads are far enough apart that the blanket might seem to be more for show than for warmth. It's thick sunshine colored threads and purposefully frayed edges, however, seem to provide the exact amount of heat needed at any time and any season. Over the years, this blanket as adorned my playpen as a baby, and served as my companion on the floor while watching television. When I finally moved away from my hometown, I would take the red eye flight home to visit, and spent hours sitting on the couch catching up with my grandmother until sleep slowly overtook me and I fell into a long deep slumber. When I would wake up, I would always find this little yellow blanket thrown over my body. It felt like home.

It's no surprise then that when my grandmother passed away a couple years ago, this was the one memento that I personally removed from her house. When I look at it, something just reminds me of home, and I forget how drastically my life has changed over the last 2 years. A little piece of me remembers that I didn't always refer to California as my "home," and that I would spend weeks in anticipation of going to New Jersey and being in the company of the one person in my life who ever truly understood me and loved me anyway. It sounds silly, but this blanket isn't just some stupid trinket like Lunis would carry around for security in the Peanuts comics, it is a piece of everything that was good about my childhood - it is the work of love from my grandmother. Until recently, Somehow this blanket has somehow retained a faint trace of the scent of her home. Maybe it was in my mind, but the smell of her house had seemed to be permanently ground into the fabric of the threads... Until Now.

I know it is obvious that after 2 years, anything can lose its original scent, but it still made me sad to realize that the traces of my grandmother have finally removed themselves from my blanket, and I guess I just miss her. My life is moving on, and so am I. My family has grown in so many ways. I have gained 3 cousins and a niece since she left my life - all of whom I love dearly. Family events don't seem as empty as they did that first Christmas without her, but every once in a while my mind takes me back to a different part of my life, and I feel ashamed for denying that it was once my world. I don't want to lose the memories I once cherished so much, or the lessons that I finally understand... Remembering my grandmother reminds me that despite everything that happened, there was beauty and happiness in my childhood. Sometimes I try so hard to shut out the bad that I block out the good as well.

I have filled my life with people who love me. I have friends who are like family in 3 states - including the one I live in now. I have learned to let these people into my heart and share with them the parts of me I once felt I could only share with my grandmother - my failures, and embarrassments as well as my hopes and my happiness. This has helped me to come to terms with her death, and taught me that everything will work itself out in the end. However, on nights like tonight, when I am scrambling to put together some sort of plan for my life - wrapped up in my little yellow blanket, I find that my heart aches to hear her voice - just for one word of encouragement to get me going, or a small breath of air that feels like home...