Grandma's Oblivion

Yiayia, what’s oblivion?

-“Yiayia, what’s oblivion?”

-“Oblivion is forgetting.”

-“And what’s forgetting?”

-“It’s when you can’t remember someone, or something!”

-“Ah ha!” shouted Phaethon.  He was five years old.

Time passed, and Phaethon grew older.  A teenager now, he saw his grandmother getting older too, and he watched her fall into forgetting, into Oblivion.  He simply couldn’t take it— he wanted his grandmother back!  He wanted yiayia the way she’d been, the way he’d always known her.  He wanted a grandmother with an open mind, who was friendly and brave and unshakeable and smart and active! A grandmother whose presence in his life was so important, who offered him love and safety and courage.  A grandmother who cared for him calmly and with patience, without pressure.  A grandmother who had taught him about his roots, about the past, about life.  

But, let’s take things from the top…

Oblivion comes to visit

Oblivion came over suddenly one day, breaking into the house entirely unexpected.  

The thief Oblivion had come for my yiayia.  It wanted to take her memories, her feelings and life experience, and throw them into the eternal darkness of forgetting.

It was a morning like any other.  I got ready for school with the same identical routine as always, and when I finished I went to my yiayia’s in-home studio to give her the first kiss of the day, just like I’d done every day for years, even when she was sleeping.

When I opened the door I heard my yiayia shouting in fear: “HEEEY!! Who’s there?! Who are you?!  What did you come here to do?!”

 I approached calmly, “It’s Phaethon, Yiayia, it’s me!  Who’d you think it was?  And why are you up so early, were you dreaming?”

She looked at me suspiciously, with crooked eyes and a face still half-buried in sheets.  Lifting herself up, she stretched her head forward and peered at me again, but as if for the first time.  I peered back, trying to figure what in the world was happening.  We sat like that for a while, staring at each other, until my grandma suddenly exclaimed:

“Oh, my boy, how are you?  Where are you off to?  Why are you up so early?”

I was in shock.  What was going on?  Didn’t yiayia know that every morning after I got ready for school I came up to say hi?  I ran downstairs to tell my mom what was happening.  

“Mom! Something is wrong with yiayia!” I shouted, turning and running back up the stairs as fast as I could.  

By the time my mom burst through the door, my yiayia had already turned on her side and was either sleeping or pretending to.  We let it go, figuring the whole thing was just some random episode.  It wasn’t until later—much later—that I realized that was the day thieving Oblivion had come for my grandma…