Oma

When I was a little girl my Oma (grandmother) came to visit us from Holland. We picked her up from the airport and as we drove from Toronto she looked out the window of the car in wonder and said, “when you see all that you can understand that the world is a big ball”. Once at our house she was fascinated by the singers and dancers on the Lawrence Welk show as she watched with a smile on her face for the entire hour. In the morning she would sit on our balcony in awe of the size of our back yard and savour the flavour of freshly brewed coffee.

I was home alone with her one day, and she tripped while coming out of the back door, and she couldn’t get up off of the patio. She sat there and told me that she was stuck. I wanted to call for help, but she laughed and told me that we should just wait for my mother to come home from work. I told her that it would be hours before my mother would return, and she said that if that was the case I should get some tea, snacks and a board game and enjoy the opportunity that was given to us. I made us some Earl Grey and brought out the Speculaas (Dutch cookies). Two hours went by quickly, and my mother came home and helped my Oma up off the ground. She had won 2 games of “Sorry” and let me win 3. The first thing she did once on two feet was go to pee.

I didn’t realize it as a young girl, but I now understand that my Oma knew that every moment presented to us is to be embraced. When you hear the phrase, “everything happens for a reason”, the reason is simply to live in what is happening and not to fear it. Experience it all and take from it what it presents. Oma would never have said any of these things. She would just dare to do and be. xoxo