Good grief, grandma.

Yesterday was Easter. It was also the last holiday my mom's side of the family spent out at my grandparents' farm. It's the last because my grandma died about six months ago (grandpa died quite a few years before her), and they're selling the farm.

My grandma's death has hit me harder than anyone else's in my life. Especially for the first couple months after, I would go on crying jags, and just about anything could set me off. It's not as if she went unexpectedly, I mean, she was over 90. We all knew it was going to happen sooner rather than later.

I think what bothers me the most about my grandma dying (besides of course the fact that I'll never see her again) is that it signals the end of what I've known all my life. One thing I had always been able to depend on was going out to the farm for Easter, Thanksgiving and Christmas (and pretty much every Sunday, if I were so inclined) and seeing a good portion of my extended family. Now the holidays are being split up between three separate cities, and it will be more of an excuse for people to go to other holiday things, since the tradition is broken.

I'd like to make clear, though, I'm not hating change, or trying to stop it...I'm just mourning for what I've lost. And I think that is what separates many liberals from conservatives. Conservatives want things to stay the same as they've always been, or want to go back to some imagined "good old days," while liberals are much more open to change.

My grandma was a liberal, though I'm not sure she would have identified herself as one. She never had a problem accepting when my aunt and uncle adopted a black girl, or when my cousin married a Mexican girl, or when my brother married a Japanese girl. They were part of the family, and it didn't matter where they came from, or what color their skin was. She thought Bush was a terrible president. She liked watching Ellen Degeneres and didn't have a problem with her being a lesbian.

She also never said anything demeaning to me when I dropped out of college, even though education is important in our family, and a good portion of us all are teachers. She knew I had to make my own decisions. She just told me how happy she was when I told her I was going back to school. No judgement, only positive reinforcement when I got back on the right path.

As someone who doesn't believe in any god or afterlife, I don't even have the false hope that someday I'll see her again in Heaven. And I think that can make grief harder for atheists. We don't get to say, "Oh, they're happy in Heaven, waiting with Jesus, watching over me." We just know that that's it, that short time on Earth is all we get, so we damn well better make the most of it.

But I know that my grandma lived a good life. She was also able to live at home up until the last couple years of her life, which is pretty awesome, and she kept her wits about her right up to the end, and she was surrounded by family in her last days.

So here's to you, Grandma. Love you.