5 | In Loving Memory of Lois

Today’s episode is interrupting our normal broadcasting to walk down memory lane. My Grandma Lois died seven years ago today and I thought it fitting for me to sit down and talk about how much I love and miss her. This episode is not scripted like the others so it has a different feel to it. 

Today, I wanted to take a moment to talk about the impact she had on my life and how I carry her with me every day! I have plenty more stories that I’m sure I’ll add into future episodes. 

Have a listen and stay tuned for next week’s episode. 

Xoxo Chelsey

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hey, it's Chelsea, and welcome to Permission to Rise, a podcast for women ready to find their voice, embrace healing, and rise into their fullest potential. If you're ready to stop shrinking and start showing up for your life, this podcast is your permission to rise. So I've been scripting most of my episodes up until this point, and I'll probably continue to do so. I have a bunch of other content that's already written and ready to rock and roll when the time is right. But this episode I want to do a little more ad lib. So I will warn you that I'm not exactly sure where it's going or how it will end, but today's episode is in memory of my grandma Lois. She passed away seven years ago today. Well, April 28th, when this podcast launches. She was my biggest supporter. I honestly don't think that there is anyone on this planet that will ever love me as unconditionally as that woman loved me. I like to say that I was the daughter she never had. And that's not a dig at my aunt. But I feel like Lois' daughter was more of a daddy's girl. I think that with me, my grandma got the little girl that she always wanted, the one that admired her and loved her and wanted to help her with her Stanley Home products business. I was always enthusiastic to help her. My favorite time of year was when she got new catalogs and she would print out Avery labels and call me up and say, Do you want to come label catalogs? It was the best time. I got to sit at the table in their little back coffee room and simply label catalogs. Of course, she paid me to do so, so there was some value in that. But the thing I missed the most isn't the money, it's the time that we got to spend together. She always used to pay us to do little things. She'd always pay me to come clean her house, and honestly, we didn't get much cleaning done. I think it was just her paying for time in company. Of course, as kids, I think my brother and I were both motivated by some of that. But I look back now and I think, yeah, there was joy in the money, but it was also just fun to be there with them. My grandma and grandpa owned this building on Main Street in our small town. There was the office up front for my grandpa's accounting business and the family room in the back, a big heated garage, and the upstairs was an apartment with a full kitchen, bathroom, bedroom. We pretty much lived there. The door was always open. I remember running in the back door late at night. Grandpa had the baseball game on, always blaring loud. Every time I hear a baseball announcer, it just takes me back. And Grandma would make us a small snack. Usually she'd have this big bag of peaches from Sam's club that she would pull out of the freezer. She'd pour a few in a bowl, and I'd just kind of eat them as they thawed. And then we'd go home. Go to bed. We were there for our late night snack. When my parents divorced, my dad lived in the apartment building right next to them. So we were always in and out the door. They had this dresser in the garage, and my grandma put a lot of old dishes in there. So we would play restaurant. We used the big huge barrel of packing peanuts that grandma had from her orders, and we'd pour it into a measuring cup, and then we'd pour it out into the bowl, and we'd salt and pepper it, and we'd go to the front and write out a menu and copy it on the photo machine and then bring it back. We were just always using our imaginations. It was a blast. My grandma supported me in every venture that I had. And sometimes she had to tell me no, or sometimes she didn't find anything that she needed, but most of the time she bought something, and I could always count on her to do that. She never riled me about it. She never made me feel less than. There was always just this unconditional support, this understanding that what I was doing was just totally normal. I think back on this a lot because lately I've just needed somebody to talk to. And she used to be the person that I could always go to. Now, granted, she's very Christian, very Catholic woman, so I didn't tell her everything. But I used to just go to her house and talk about my frustrations and bear a little bit of my soul sometimes. And she just listened. She'd give me some advice, some of which I am now starting to take. And I'm going, okay, I hear you. I didn't hear you then, and I didn't want to hear it, but now I do and I get it. I understand where you're coming from. But despite anything that I did or any part of myself and who I was, she loved me anyway. I know that she didn't like my tattoos, and I know that she always had something to say about my hair color, even like 48 hours before she died. She was saying something about my hair. It was always, it's gonna fall out. You can't keep coloring it. And despite all of those things, though, she never made me feel less than. Any comment that she ever made about my tattoos or my hair never came off as being so, I don't know how to put it. Like it just never made me feel less than. It never made me feel low. It was just okay, grandma has an observation today. I loved that. My grandma was the youngest of 13. They had three boys and 10 girls. Two of the boys died young. But toward the end of her life, she was kind of the last one left. And I think that was hard on her because she was a very social butterfly. The common theme that we talked about after she passed away was that they were always gathered at the table, and that was so true. We always sat at the table to play cards, to eat breakfasts, to label catalogs. It was always just at the table with conversation. And I think in her last few years, she was kind of left to herself, and I think she struggled with that a lot. And I'm someone who kind of likes to sit and be by myself and be with my thoughts. And my grandpa was very much like that. So I think her and him were very different. I think he liked to socialize, but I also think that he was the kind of person who was good to just hang out. My dad often ru remarks on the fact that like he would sit in the garage with his fly swatter. And there's just bits and pieces about my grandparents that I don't I don't know. I have so many questions. I think about these things and I look back on these moments and I think, wow, like we're so much alike, and I just didn't know it. And I don't think I was at the age where I was able to, like where I was soul searching or able to ask those questions or know what I needed to ask. And now I feel like I have so many questions I can't get answered, you know, about business, about love, about life. If I could have anything, it would, it would be to just have one more meal. One more meal with my grandma. To be able to sit down and talk and laugh and have those questions answered. And when she passed away, we didn't bury her until the afternoon because the priest had to go to a different church for confirmations. But I remember going back out there later in the evening after everybody had gone. And I said, I don't know what to do. I feel like I lost the person that always felt like she was always going to be there. And I stood there looking at the grave where my grandma was to my left and my grandpa was to my right, and that's where they always were sitting at the table when I'd walk into the room. And I got this big picture, just this clear vision of them saying, Hey, it's okay. And they were sitting at the table, and they said, You gotta go live your life. Cause it's not time yet. And and when it is, when you've lived your life, there's a spot for you here. And it really pained me to hear that, but it also just made me feel like I'm gonna be okay. That the two people that were always in my life will still be there even to the end. That even if I don't know where I'm going in this life and I'm lost and I'm confused, or I'm struggling with myself, I know exactly where I'm going. That there's a beautiful place for me after all of this. I feel like I'm all over the place with this. I have so many notes jotted down, and I'm like, okay, we're gonna talk about this and we're gonna talk about that. And I wish I would have scripted this, but I feel like there really was no way to script this. I needed it to be raw, and I needed it to be just a moment to talk about my grandma, to go back through all of the things. My grandma would come pick me up after work, or I'd pick her up after work when I lived in Mankato because she was going to the cancer center there to do her cancer treatments. Before she lost her car privileges, she would pick me up and we'd go to Olive Garden. Never understood why. Because she didn't eat pasta, but she'd always get a meal and she would get her glass of water and she'd tell the guy, I need two straws for my big mouth. And I traveled to Colorado years ago, and I remember grabbing a straw for her at the 7-Eleven because it was this big, huge straw for like 99 cents. And I was like, Here, I got you something. I got you a big straw for your big mouth. And it was just a little joke that we had with each other. But we always went to Olive Garden and she ordered a slice of cheesecake. I never really liked cheesecake, but I was willing to try it because she just wanted a bite. And it was this white chocolate raspberry cheesecake, and it was the most delicious thing. So that was what we always did. And this last week I decided to make my own version because Olive Garden stopped selling it. So I made the most amazing cheesecake, and it just had me thinking about her and how I told my friends, like, don't talk to me when she goes, because I'm gonna spend a whole week binging golden girls, which was also our thing, and I'm just gonna need a cheesecake, and I'm just gonna sit here. So it was just nostalgic to make that cheesecake. When I was nine, I got kicked out of daycare. That's a whole other story. Best day of my nine-year-old life. But I got to go to my grandma's in the morning before school, and my mom would drop me off at like 5:30 in the morning because she had to work at 6. And my grandma would either be asleep in her chair or sleep in bed in like the side room off of the family room downstairs. My grandpa would be upstairs. They slept in separate rooms. I would watch TV like Golden Girls or Designing Women or Save by the Bell until my grandpa would come downstairs at six in the morning. And my grandma would get up a little shortly after. They taught me how to use the coffee pot and make them coffee in the morning. So I at 6 a.m. would start the coffee. My grandpa would come downstairs, my grandma would come out of the bedroom, and we'd sit at the table, and my grandpa would hand me money and I'd go to the bakery down the street and get fresh, fresh donuts. Like, best case scenario. Like, I don't know how I'm not 500 pounds, but I'm always searching and seeking for donuts that taste just like that place because it's just been the best donut that I've ever found. I haven't found anything until this past summer that has even compared. And of course, it's like all the way in northern Minnesota, like five bajillion miles away. So that was a really, really fun thing this summer to find a donut that was like exactly like that. We used to also then sit and play Rummy 500. My grandma was teaching me that, I think as early as age five, because I remember my grandpa standing behind me telling me which cards to play. And so that just became our thing that we would do even before school. I was doing math and playing card games. We rode up with them to Canada a few different summers. And the one summer we were in the motorhome. My grandpa would drive all the way up to Lake of the Woods, Canada. And I was a hundred in the hole and came back and beat my grandma. And that's always been this story that I tell. But this last year, my brother and I have been playing Rummy now. I taught him a couple of years ago. So I feel like they're looking down on us, going, This is so great. You know, like we're bonding over this and having a really great time. I was negative 285 in the hole and beat my brother by five points. I was like, okay, that defeats anything that I ever had with my grandma. But it just makes me smile and it makes me think of them every single time. I think they would be so happy to know that we sit there and play that. And like always, with grandparents and other family members, they sometimes tend to embarrass you. She would always introduce me so proudly. She was always so proud of me, and people always said that. I grew up in a very small community, so everybody knows everybody, and everybody's like, oh my gosh, you're Grandma Lois, she loved you so much. But she'd always introduce me as, oh, this is my granddaughter Chelsea, and she took five years of accounting up at MSU. And I'm like, yep, uh-huh, five total years. Okay, yep. And she just that was the way she introduced me, and I knew it was coming every single time. I recall bringing my best friend from college home after my grandpa died to show her where I lived and where I was from and share more of my life with her because losing my grandpa was really hard on me. I started to realize just how much him and I are very much alike and how I really didn't get to know him the way that I wish I would have. And I also watched him die, which I don't recommend, but I don't think I would have been able to leave the room when we took him off life support. So it was a little traumatic, but I brought my friend Jenna home and we're sitting in the living room. At this point, my grandma had gotten rid of my grandpa's chair. We were sitting on the couch, her chair was now where my grandpa's chair used to be. And we had this pause and conversation, and all of a sudden she goes, Chelsea, where'd you get your big boobs? Your mom doesn't have boobs that big. I never had boobs that big. I can't even. Jenna and I sat there trying so hard not to laugh, and I'm like, Yep, mm-hmm, okay. How about another embarrassing moment? But like, what? I just we think about this every single time and we laugh about it all the time. And there is a moment on my Facebook where on this day I had posted about it. So when she died on April 28th, I'd posted about it, and my friend Jenna was like, Oh yeah, oh my gosh, I remember when this happened, and I'm like, of course, because how could we forget? And then it was two days later that it showed up on this day, and I'm like, how crazy that it could show up. So it was just another way to find a smile at a time that was really hard. So every year I look forward to the day when I can share that post. We just had a conversation about this the other day, too, though. How we'll never forget it. It's just one of those core memories that will stick around. But she was always just so blunt. We'd go out to a restaurant and she couldn't get a waiter's attention, and I'd just be like, Oh, just be patient. You don't need to like flag, flag them over. Or if she'd flagged them over so many times, I'm like, you can't be the only one in the restaurant today. Let them give other people attention. She would start singing, and it would just be some sort of song. Like she always did the whole, I need a little lovin'. Yes, I do. And we would just crack up, but also be so embarrassed. Now it's just one of those funny stories, but in the moment it was so embarrassing, and it just felt like this crazy, crazy thing. Like, oh, here we go. This is who we're with. But I love her for that. I love her for being exactly who she was. No apology. I think back to the woman that my grandma was and and what she did with her business, and I realized that she just stuck it out. My family had a lot of things to say about her Stanley business all the time. It really pissed me off. Some of them were very like, oh, you're Stanley, yes, of course. You know, that dripping, sarcastic, belittlement shit that people do. And I'm just like, nobody ever really took her seriously. I don't think that they believed in her the way that she believed in everyone else, the way that she believed in herself, the way that she stood by her product. And I love that. She provided value to women and she just kept pushing through. She rose above all of it. When she passed away, the song Rise Up by Andre Day kept showing up at random on my um on my Apple Music. And I was like in tears by this song, just completely moved by it. And I couldn't figure out why. And then I was looking through the lyrics, and it was just like my grandma was there with me. Like she was letting me know that everything was gonna be okay. Because I was really struggling at that point. In the next few podcasts, I'll probably be talking about more about like what was going on at that time, but I was struggling, and I think it was just like her message to me to say, hey, I'm here to hold your hand. Like we're gonna do this together, that even if I'm not here, it's gonna be okay. That's why I changed my name of my boutique to the Rise Boutique. I hate using the word boutique, but eventually that will kind of shift. And I'm glad that I'm doing the podcast because I think that that is it's just a it's a layer of something. It it's it's so much more me than anything else, and I'm so happy to do this. And again, this episode is like crazy insane. I'm gonna edit this and be like, oh, I should have scripted it, but we're gonna do this. This is raw. This is gonna be crazy. And if you don't want to listen to it, I'm not gonna be mad. But if you do and you're still here, thank you. Because I think that we can all learn something from our love for other people and how much we hold on to that makes everything worth it. Like looking at the way that she was treated and how I've been treated by my own mom in the same way, where it's like people don't always believe in what you're doing, they don't always see the same vision. But my grandma never gave up. She was die hard with her business, she stuck by it, she didn't care. And even if she did, I never got that impression from her. She never let on that she was sad or low or down or burdened by anything that anyone had to say about it. And I admire that so much. That's part of some of the questions that I have for her about business is how did you do it? How did you do it in the hard moments? How did you stick with it when things were tough or when people had rejection or when you struggled, you know, did you ever struggle to believe in yourself or your product? Like, I have so many questions and I don't know why it didn't occur to me to ask them. And when I broke up with my boyfriend over COVID, which was of course like after she passed, I was just like, oh, I have I have so many questions about how you fell in love with grandpa. Was it, you know, did it become a marriage of like we're Catholic, we're not getting divorced? Did you, you know, do you do you love him fully, truly, or was this just one of those things where you did love him, but the love fell out? Like, how did how did your love age? You know, I'm I have so many questions. And that's why I've always implored a lot of my friends, and I'm also starting to do this for myself with other people in my life, is to just ask them. But sometimes people aren't ready to answer. I've noticed that too, that if you're not in tune with yourself and you're not deep diving and soul searching and digging deep into why you do what you do or how you really truly feel about things, it's hard to answer those questions for yourself, let alone for anyone else. So to ask them, that's really hard. Because you don't know what you're gonna get, and some people aren't prepared for it. Like, I'm really excited to do this podcast because I want to bring women on and I want to deep dive. I have a few women in my life that I'm like, but what about this? Like, what do you really want? How do you really feel? And I don't think they're ready to answer those questions. Because I think some of them just go, eh, whatever. Like, I'm just getting through the day and my schedule is so tight. And it's like, but when do you take time for yourself? I get that you're busy, I get that you have kids, but you're a person too. That's what I want to do is I want to, I want to soul search, I want to deep dive those questions.

unknown 21:59

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SPEAKER_01 22:00

I want to provide a safe space for women because I feel like my grandma provided me a safe space for me. And it probably was safe for her too. That woman never told me no. I mean, she'd take me to the county fairs with her every year. And I know that it cost her so much money. I know it now as a business owner. The cost of entry, the cost of parking, the cost of food every single day, like she couldn't have made money. And even if she did, or even if her sales took off after the event because it was more of a marketing advertising thing, she took me with her. She paid for food for me to be there. And I almost feel like she never told me no. Sometimes she would, but it never felt like no. Sometimes I think it was, oh, not today, or maybe tomorrow, or you've done enough today. Like if I had already ridden all the rides or I'd already done all the games, you know, she did have to say no, but it just it never felt harsh. It never felt like she put me down. She never made it feel like it was a burden. And I think about that now because I'm like, wow, I stress so much about things and I feel the pressure. And then I put that pressure on other people, or I've seen how I've done that in the past. And I don't want to do that. I need to just go and do with intention and know that what I'm doing is right and not try to make something more. Know my limits, but just be somewhere and not be so preoccupied with all of the other things in the background. I admire my grandma for that. And I'm sure that we pissed her off so many times. My brother and I riled her up a few times too, and we weren't always the easiest to be around, let's be honest. But there was just so much love there. I feel like we were the grandkids that were always there, were probably there the most because the door was always open and we lived a block away, and they catered to us all the time. My brother and I were reminiscing one time at his house about how grandma and grandpa would drive us anywhere we needed to go. And my mom was like, Wait, what? They took you where? And she goes, When was this? And we're like, Oh, I don't know, like you were probably at work. It was probably in the summertime, but like anytime we needed something, we just drive over there. We'd just go over and they'd be like, we'd be like, Grandma, can you take me here? Grandpa, can you take me there? And they just did for us all the time. My grandma used to leave boxes of mac and cheese upstairs in the kitchen. She never ate it because she was diabetic. So she would not consume pasta, and it wasn't part of their diet, my grandparents. It was always meat and potatoes, meat and potatoes. They would complain about my mom serving us pasta, but she would always leave boxes of mac and cheese because in fifth grade, my friends and I would come home from school and we'd go upstairs and we would make mac and cheese. And my friend at the time had this thing about salting her mac and cheese, which was like awesome because we never did that at home. And so it was just our special fun thing that we did. But there was one day that the stove didn't work, so I went downstairs looking for my grandma and she wasn't there, but my aunt was because again, my grandpa had his accounting business there, so she was working because she worked for my grandpa, and she got mad. She blew up at us. And I recall this, like she was angry because we were upstairs and we shouldn't be. And I was like, uh, what? We were given permission. I can totally be here. Well, it must have been like 10 minutes later that my grandma walked through the door, and I was like, Yeah, so she yelled at us because we were upstairs and the oven isn't working right. My grandma went off on her and was like, they can be up there, they're doing nothing wrong, it's fine, I've allowed it. And it just like made me feel good and smug because I was like, she just had my back. She always just like loved me and it just made me feel so good. I'm trying to think if there's anything else that I can say because there's just so much to unpack. But the last four months of her life were really hard. It was really hard to watch because she basically gave up. And I don't blame her. You know, she starved herself to death for four months, pretty much, and I think she just had enough. And every little thing that happened in her life, she had a heart attack, she had cancer, she beat it, she beat cancer again. You know, my whole family kind of wrote her off. I think they thought, oh, this is it. Open heart surgery at the age of 80 something, she ain't gonna make it. And I was like, who the hell do you think you're looking at? Like, she's gotten through everything, every hard thing that has happened to her. She has come through it all with flying colors. She's so resilient. It's amazing. And she comes through it with a smile. She's honestly genuinely happy. But I think after her sister died, her last remaining relative, and all of the things that were happening with her just being stuck upstairs in that house. She was stuck upstairs in the apartment like fucking Rapunzel. And my family wasn't always watching and taking care of her. And I have my own regrets of not like spending more time with her or telling her no. I know she just wanted somebody to eat out with her one more time, but I was always eating out at that point. And I was like, I just I can't do it. I can't stomach another burger. And I'd say, I'll drive you through the drive-thru. We can get you food. And she'd go, Nope, never mind. Because she didn't want the meal, she wanted the company. And I think that when her sister died, I think she just realized that she really truly was alone. Most of her friends had passed away. She could tell you exactly how many widows there were in Winnebago. I think at one point the number was up to 45 because she's been counting. And she didn't have the same kind of social circle. She wanted people to come over to the Stanley store that she had set up in the front office, and she wanted people to come in and socialize, but she didn't get that socialization the way that she needed to. And I don't think she would have been happy in it in an assisted living. She definitely would not have been happy in a nursing home because she needed, she was like go-getter, constantly needing, you know, stimulation and chat. And I don't think she would have gotten that there. She had a really hard time when she was there over um when she had her open heart surgery and she had to stay for a few months. She had a really hard time with that. But watching her for four months was really, really tough. But I love that she went out on her own. I love that she said, I get to decide when I'm ready to go. And that was how she did it. She did it on her own terms. I remember one day stopping by on my way, I would I would go to Mankato for groceries, and then I would come back through Mapleton, which is where she was staying. And I remember having my phone, or I was sitting there with my phone for a little bit, and then I was like, Okay, I have to go, Grandma. And she goes, Wait, can can we call your grandma Barb? And I go, Yeah, we can call Grandma Barb because they didn't let her have a phone. Because the last time she was in the nursing home, she called people at all hours of the day. So they were like, uh, no, she can't have a phone. I'm like, you literally completely isolated her. This is ridiculous. So I let her use my phone and she called my grandma Barb and we had a little chit-chat, and then I was about ready to go. And before I could go, she was like, Wait, I want to call my friend Mary. And she had this friend who apparently I found out she had been friends with since she was 16. They both had their appendix removed at the same time, and they met in the hospital and they had been friends ever since. And granted, my grandma at the time was like 86, I think. So imagine 70 years of your life having this friend. And she goes, Can I call her? I just need to talk to her. And I said, Yeah, we can call Mary. And so I handed her my phone and she dialed up the number, and she goes, I don't know if this is the right number. And I'm like, Well, we'll find out. And so listening, she we put it on speakerphone, and they answered, she answered the phone, and it was Mary. We had the right number, and I just could have cried at how cute it was to listen to her talk. It was like she found her long-lost puppy, like her best friend. I mean, it just was like the most beautiful thing to listen to both of them go, I didn't know how to get a hold of you. That's what Mary said. I didn't know how to get a hold of you. I've been stuck in home with my own injuries, and I just needed to talk to you. And they talked for a little bit, and it was just the most beautiful thing that I had ever witnessed because I was like, wow, to just have such a really great bond and friendship like that is just so real and so great. And I it made her so happy. And it made me feel so good to be able to do that for her because nobody in my family was doing that. No one was listening. And I just I will never forget that. How the joy, the happiness between the both of them, it was just really great. And even like a couple days before she passed away, it just everybody kind of thought that she was losing it. But I mean, you'd lose it too if you were on liquid morphine all the time. But she was with it. You know, she said a few things to me that I went, yep, I you know exactly where you are. You know, you're caught between the two worlds of like leaving this one and and being here, and there's nothing wrong. You're not losing your mind, you're just leaving this world. And I think the thing that she needed was my grandma Barb to come visit her because she was holding on and holding on and holding on, and we told my grandma Barb, like, you have to go visit her. But my grandma doesn't always like to see people in that time of their life, but we got her to go over there and visit, and it was like once that visit happened, she was able to let go. And at the time I was struggling with it because I couldn't sleep well. I recall waking up that Sunday morning at like four o'clock, a little after four. And at the time I had been playing this color by number game on my phone just as a way to pass time and to de-stress. And so I sat up at four in the morning playing this game. And I recall looking at the clock. I had a Fitbit on my wrist, and I flipped it up and I went, oh, 445. And then I flipped it back up and I went, oh, it's 445. And I sat there for a couple beats and I went, wow, 445. And my dad texted me a little after 5 to say that she died at 4.45. How that even happens, I don't even know.

SPEAKER_00 32:39

This episode is gonna drop at 4.45 a.m. on Tuesday, April 28th, 2026. It's been seven years since she passed away. And I don't go a day without thinking about her. I have a few of her things, like a dresser that she had upstairs, and a jewelry box that we used to play with, complete with some jewelry of hers that just happened to end up in the box when she gave it to me.

SPEAKER_01 33:12

It's all fashion, you know, cheap jewelry, but I leave it there.

SPEAKER_00 33:17

I have a few rings that she's given me over the years, and I've held on to some things that mean the most to me. Nothing huge, but it just feels like I get to keep a part of her with me. The one thing about moving and being farther away from Winnebago is that I don't get to go out to the cemetery when I need a little moment with her. It's one of my favorite places because it's just so peaceful out there.

SPEAKER_01 33:46

I usually sit out there until the bugs bother me, and then I go, okay, fine.

SPEAKER_00 33:50

I feel like it's grandma going, okay, she's just bugging me, telling me that I need to not be sitting there, not be so sad, that this is life, and that there's always a place at the table. So when I feel a little lost, I just remember that when it's time, I know exactly where I'm gonna be. And there's a little bit of peace and comfort in that. And I get to take her everywhere I go.

SPEAKER_01 34:16

I get to bring her into the part of my business. That's why my mannequin, her name is Lois. In case you're ever wondering why I referred to her as that. I haven't referred to her in a while because I haven't dressed her because, well, I don't have a boutique storefront anymore. Lois Jean Morris. She always had her initials LJM on everything. I think I still have some 31 things of hers that she always embroidered with her initials. I have glass candy jars at my desk at work because they always used to have candy in the back office. They'd have a basket up front with all sorts of different things in it, like hard candies and cinnamon discs and peppermint patties and just like all these little things as a treat for people who walked in the office. And I never knew who did it, but it's actually my grandpa who would fill them. So I told myself when I had a boutique I was gonna find some really cute jars since I couldn't have the ones that they used. And now I have them at my desk at work, which is horrible because I fill them with candy that I have to try to avoid eating. But it's just a nostalgic thing, and I love it. I love that I get to bring a little piece of them along with me on this journey. If you've listened this far, I hope you take a moment today to tell your loved ones that you love them. And if they're not here anymore, that you do something to honor their memory, whether it be to donate your time or your money, or make something that you used to make together. Bake something or go on a little walk, or go out to the cemetery and talk to them. Whatever it is that brings you a little bit of peace, I hope you find it, and I don't know. I don't know how to end this. It's just I just wanted to talk about my grandma, talk about how much I miss her, and that every year this time of year is harder. But as long as I continue to find the joy, and as long as I keep her close and I take what she did teach me, and I pour that back into this podcast and into the world, things will always be a little brighter. Thank you so much for listening today. I hope you enjoyed my little walk down memory lane. Stay tuned for next week's episode as I dig back into my healing journey. Be sure to follow Permission to Rise podcast on Facebook and Instagram. Episodes drop every Tuesday.