I didn't know what to do.

This is a story about the first time I realized something wasn't right… and how long that moment stays with you.

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Transcript:

It was a sunny summer afternoon in 1979. I was wearing a gold polyester uniform. I was a waitress at Weeks Family Restaurant. It was my first actual real job, and I loved it. Interacting with people, talking to people you would never talk to. I loved the people I worked with.

As I looked toward the front of the restaurant, I saw a gentleman come in and sit at the counter. So I went down to give him a menu and see if he wanted coffee or a glass of water.

It was my Grampy Max.

I said, "hi, Grampy Max!" and he grinned at me. I didn't notice anything at first.

"Max, it's me. It's Barbie!" I said to him, to which he responded with a very flirty, inappropriate reply about Barbie dolls.

I was looking at somebody I knew and they had no idea who I was. And saw me not as - a grandchild but as, as someone to flirt with.

I'm one day post funeral for a neighborhood mom. Neil's mother's name was Mary. Mary was your classic stay at home mom that opened her home to everybody. She lived in three different houses on one block, right near Whites Park in Concord.

So I went to the calling hours and I was talking to Neil, and I said, "how are we here? How are we here? I wish it was 1980" and he said, "I wish it was 1987" and that was the year both of us would've been juniors and seniors in high school.

We just wanted to go back to a time where we felt grown up enough to enjoy the grownup things. You know, sneaking beer in a field, I guess, but young enough that our whole life was ahead of us.

And I know for me, and I think it's true for a lot of people, the aging process happens quickly and all of a sudden you find yourself: caring for my mother.

The more I watch her, the more I see, where she's, you know, beginning the long walk home, right? Where she's struggling physically, where she's struggling emotionally, and, and it's a reminder that - there's a lot she just can't do by herself, and that's just the reality of it.

Then I look at Kenny, who's 70, he'll be 71 in September. Am I expecting too much of him? Does he sleep late in the morning 'cause he is just exhausted, not because he's trying to be a jerk? Am I asking too much of him around Jack? He has such a good rapport with Jack, but I, I just notice and watch now.

I'm watching how things change and they change subtly so you don't notice it right away. This hurts me and makes me sad and I'm surrounded by it.

And I was dumbfounded. I was 15 years old, just about to turn 16, and I was horrified - paralyzed.

The manager of the restaurant watched this interaction and came over to scold Max, my Grampy, and I said, no, no, no, wait. And walked away with him and told him that it was my step-grandfather, that he didn't know me. We should call my grandmother, which we did, and she came down and got him. She didn't realize he left the house.

I was looking at somebody I knew and they had no idea who I was.

I didn't know what to do.

[OUTRO]

I wrote all of this down later, on a crumpled, coffee stained napkin.

If you want to see it, it's in my newsletter.

I hope you like it, Grampy Max.

Credits:

Sleepless by Clavier-Music

Clavier's Youtube

Restaurant Ambience