My Grandmother’s Eyes
Remembering my grandma three years after her death
People say I have my grandmother’s eyes.
Hers were hazel, with a ring of gold circling her pupils. Mine are much the same. When they catch enough light, they appear moss-green — like the forest surrounding the place I grew up in. Other times, they look almost blue, like my mom’s, or cedar-brown, like my dad’s.
Separated by seventy-something years and a decades-long smoking habit, the skin around Grandma’s eyes was like fragile, translucent tissue paper, whereas mine is still mostly unweathered, except for the dark circles that come from studying for final exams and reading late into the wee hours of the morning. Grandma always said if I read too much my eyes would go bad, like hers.
When I remember Grandma, I think of the hot summer afternoons we spent crouched around her coffee table, savoring popsicles and examining her collection of angel and cherub figurines as she did her crosswords. Her apartment didn’t have air conditioning, so she always kept the windows open to let in a cool breeze from outside.
Whenever she was tired, she would let me watch her copy of The Wizard of Oz, even when I wasn’t supposed to have anymore “screen-time” for the day. It was either The Wizard of Oz or one of the Barbie movies she got on sale at Walmart. Back then, I didn’t…
