We’re family, me and you Part 3…

…Which is the only way I can explain how one of the skirts I used to wear in high school ended up in Gigi’s closet. I don’t remember getting rid of it. Usually we just filled up Hefty bags and dropped them off at her house, so she could take them to the Sonshine Closet. Apparently she riffled through the bags before taking them.

So when I saw the skirt in her closet this Saturday I started to laugh. And I actually started to walk out of the room so I could find Gigi and tease her about wearing one of her granddaughter’s cast off clothing. And then I remembered, I couldn’t tease her because she was no longer there. And then I realized how much I was going to miss her.

It sounds cliché, but I really didn’t realize how much she helped shape me into who I am. I actually had a hard time spending time with her as I got older. Our personalities clashed and I started to distance myself. I preferred spending time with Gramps who would sit in silence and let me talk (proving that Gigi and I are more alike then I sometimes care to admit.) But she loved me, and I loved her. And here’s how the conversation would have played out if I’d had the chance to ask her about my skirt:

Beth: Gigi, what are you doing with one of my old skirts?
Gigi: You didn’t want it anymore. It’s a perfectly good skirt.
Beth: It’s a little too hip and stylish for you, don’t you think?
Gigi: You’re such a sassy mouth. I don’t know where you get it from. Your mother I suppose.
Beth: Yeah and where did she get it from?
Gigi: Her father.

Then she’d try and offer me a Halls lozenge, but I’d swipe some Big Red gum instead and we’d sit down to a game of Uno. Where we’d keep score. We score Uno in the Gasper family because Uno is serious business.

P.S. Sally asked me if I wanted the skirt back, but I said no. I’d given it away once for a reason, there was no point to take it back again. But I did take one of Gigi’s sweet vests with lace flowers and a pocket watch chain on it. And I think she’d be tickled pink to think that one her granddaughters thought something in her wardrobe was cool enough to wear.

(Three generations of Gasper women.)