Her Name Was Joyce

I have one real memory of my paternal grandma. At least I think it’s real. This memory’s validity is questioned because the majority of memories I have of her are imagined scenarios which I’ve conjured throughout my life in times of grief, confusion, curiosity, and need. I’ve stared at her picture hung in the yellow hallway of my childhood home many a time, willing her to animate so I might be able to hear her voice, see her white bundle of hair shine and move, smell her perfume. Her funeral is something I’ve also imagined, something I apparently attended but was much too young to remember. She’s in her casket, which I imagine is ivory (to match her hair), and she’s wearing the same outfit from the hallway photo. A green velvet jacket with a floral boutonniere firmly attached to her chest, whose warmth I can’t remember. My one real memory of this woman stars little me, and I’m either sitting on the floor or I’m so short that it seems like I am when I think back to it. She’s towering above me the way adults do for your first handful of years, and she’s spinning the lazy susan that’s been fashioned into the lower corner cabinet of her kitchen. It’s filled with cereal boxes, and the colors blend together as she (or maybe it was me?) spins it faster and faster for my amusement like a misused zoetrope. That’s where it ends. It sticks with me like glue on the bottom of my shoe. I’m angry at my mind for specifically remembering the lame feat of a lazy susan and not the woman it belongs to, my grandma, an inkwell of wisdom and lessons spilled out and lost, a feminine role model lost at sea, comfort incinerated.

The story goes that she was driving on a two-lane highway in 2005 when a man on the opposite side reached into his passenger seat for something and veered into my grandma’s lane, crashing into her head-on and killing my father’s mother. His mom who taught him to walk, eat, speak, and love. Who could be stubborn and irritable one moment and my father’s reprieve in the next. This crash has been manufactured, written, imagined, and turned-over a thousand times by my mind. In one she might be wearing gold hoop earrings, and in the next she might have her hair tamed with a scarf. In every one she dies quickly and peacefully. There can be no other alternative.

To make sense out of a senseless death, I’ve sometimes concluded that the man who crashed into her was tired, distressed, or misinformed. Surely the only thing that could stop my intelligent, well-meaning grandmother was an unintelligent, inconsiderate man. But he also died. He also left behind children and future grandkids who would beg his likeness to speak to them, who would make up his personality and smell colognes at the counter wondering if he smelled like one. He probably reached over into the passenger seat for something all the time, and he’d never crashed before. Maybe he hadn’t learned the importance of keeping especially vigilant on a two-lane, maybe he hadn’t ever been reprimanded for taking his hand off the wheel, maybe he hadn’t been taught how to avoid over-correcting his wheel. Maybe, maybe, maybe. Driver education could have saved my grandma, and it’s important because it prevents deaths, it prevents the sorrow of little girls and grown men. Sure, it also prevents our cars from dents and our wallets from deprivation, but those material things seem small when you’re scattering dirt on top of a casket or having to watch someone struggle through their trauma and injuries.

Telling people not to drive distracted or drunk isn’t enough. Presenting people with imagined scenarios that might or mightn’t happen isn’t enough. Stories like my grandma’s and the mysterious man who died alongside her on that long stretch of highway need to be shared. People like my father and I need to share our stories of grief and yearning. Empathy must be deployed when trying to reach the masses. During the chapter on road signs, share (with permission) the story and face of a young mother who was killed because a reckless high schooler blew a stop sign. When discussing reckless driving, bring in a grandfather to speak on how he lost his son and grandchildren to a drunk driver. Let him openly weep as he expresses his grief. Do not tolerate carelessness or ignorance. We must be consistently reminded that we are mere humans behind the wheels of two-ton man-made machines that are capable of twisting, breaking, and killing. Speeding and recklessness will not get you anywhere faster. It will not make anyone’s eyes sparkle in admiration. Driving is for transportation, and it needs to be treated as such. It is a privilege, not a right.

Everytime I get in a vehicle I think of my grandma Joyce. I buckle my seatbelt and move my phone out of the way. Whenever riding with others, I’m not ashamed to point out things they need to change about their driving, or things that other drivers do which are dangerous. I do not shy away from sharing my grandma Joyce’s story, because I hope that my pain and grief can click with somebody, that it will make them think twice next time they think it’s no big deal to take their eyes off the road and their hand off the wheel to “simply” grab something from their passenger seat. There should be no “simply” when it comes to driving. There should be “vigilance”, “care”, “patience”, “thoughtfulness”, and “empathy”.