Grandparents Day
Today, September 11th is a special day.
Because it’s Grandparents Day.
No, you are correct, it is not Grandparents Day.
But, if you are a follower of my daughter Alexa’s social media, as I am of course, you would think that today is Grandparents Day.
Because in case you didn’t know, I am the proud father of the President of the Partin Elementary School PTA.
And as an influencer, Alexa is showing some promise.
In addition to successfully squeezing a couple of dollars in donations out of me, she had me believing today was Grandparents Day.
And since I am a grandparent, which means I am old and a little slow on the uptake, I didn’t immediately process the fact that this was Grandparent’s Day for the school and the kids to celebrate, and not the actual Grandparents Day.
No, I didn’t realize that until I Googled it.
The fact is I should have known that because I wrote about it just three years ago in Ethan’s Guernica.
But since I am old, and a little slower lately, I had to look it up again.
So, in case you want to know, Grandparents Day is always the first Sunday after Labor Day.
This year, that is September 13th. I will save you other old folks the hassle of figuring that out.
And Google even confirmed that, “Yes, many schools still celebrate Grandparents Day” and “Events vary by school. Some align with National Grandparents Day in September, while others hold their events in the spring.”
And the official flower of Grandparents Day is the Forget-Me-Not.
But then, I learned that on this past July 26th, World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly was celebrated.
Wait, it’s on September 11th, it’s on September 13th, it’s on July 26th, it can be in September aligned with National Grandparents Day, or…it could be in the spring?
It’s starting to sound suspiciously like National Daughters Day, which I determined once could be any day, or maybe every day of the year.
The World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly, it turns out, is a celebration, which coincides with the Feast of Saints Joachim and Anne, who were the grandparents of Jesus.
Jesus’ grandparents, I didn’t know that either.
And Pope Leo XIV chose a verse from Isaiah as its theme.
The theme of this year’s celebration was, “I will never forget you,” from Isaiah 49:15.
I like that, “I will never forget you.”
I heard an interview recently where the speaker quoted the Roman philosopher Cicero, “Memory is the treasury and guardian of all things.”
I liked that too.
We must treasure and guard our memories.
My mom often speaks of her relationship with her grandmother Flora. I have written about Flora before. The Brooklyn Dodgers, the Bronx Zoo and riding on an elephant, the way they would share and enjoy cucumbers and onions together, and how she would slice the cucumbers really thin.
I have nice memories of my grandparents too.
My grandfather Carl winning the blue ribbon for his portrait of John F. Kennedy at the art show at the Church of the Presidents in Long Branch N.J. in the late 60s, after my friend Matt and I may have stuffed the ballot box just a little. But he was happy, and that was important.
My grandmother Eleanora taking us kids to the beach at North Long Branch in the ’57 Chevy or the ’53 Pontiac. And the time she took us to Bahrs Landing in Atlantic Highlands when my parents were attending the Fireman’s Convention in Atlantic City and let us order whatever we wanted. I ordered a lobster and was mortified when the waiter made me wear a bib. C’mon, I was six, you don’t wear bibs when you are six.
And my Norwegian grandma Sofie pointing out my father’s new jacket when she couldn’t pronounce her “J’s” properly and always replaced it with a “Y”: “Carl, you got a new yacket, Carl.”
Yesterday I got this reminder through my text messages from Seven Eleven:
“Fuel up and fill up tomorrow! Swing by to redeem your 50 cents OFF/gal. Find a store…”
You see Seven Eleven has a promotion going if you sign up for their rewards program, that on the seventh and the eleventh of September and October, you can fill up your tank and get 50 cents off a gallon.
Pretty good deal, I filled up Kim’s car on the 7th.
I have been waiting all week for September 11th to fill up my truck.
So today I got up, put on what I felt was an appropriate tee shirt, went and filled up my tank at the Seven Eleven, ran a couple of errands, and then came home and finished this story.
Because you know, this story was never about grandparents or saving fifty cents on a gallon of gas.
But it is about Forget-Me-Nots and not forgetting.
And it is about that quote from Isaiah,” I will never forget you.”
Because today, September 11th, if you are an American and older than 35 years old, you probably remember exactly what you were doing twenty-five years ago.
And what they did.
And we can never forget that.
Or them.
“The life of the dead is placed on the memories of the living. The love you gave in life keeps people alive beyond their time. Anyone who was given love will always live on in another’s heart.”
― Marcus Tullius Cicero
