Grandma energy is within.
Grandma energy is consistency, reliability, and forgiveness. It’s not a lot of talk. it’s the energy that allows you to accept the circumstances because you are being soothed.
It’s fables and outdated remedies that you go back to years later because they feel good.
I think the word culture is inextricably linked to our cultures, which are populations of microorganisms introduced into food or liquid to drive fermentation. Every culture has a unique use of cultures – traditions we preserve.
Grandma energy is like this – timeless techniques that make us feel at home with ourselves.
My favorite rap album to listen to all the way through is Outkast’s Aquemini. I think of the outro from the song Da Art of Storytellin’...
As the music fades out, a thunderstorm rolls in, and you hear a short skit between a grandmother and a young girl:
Grandmama: “Keisha, Keisha!”
Keisha: “Ma!”
Grandmama: “Cut that loud mess off. You hear all that thunderin’ and lightnin’, and get off that telephone!”
Keisha: “Ugh, alright. Grandmama, what’s all that noise? I’m scared.”
Grandmama: “Baby, don’t be scared, it’s gonna be alright. It’s just the Lord doin’ His work, okay”
It gets stormy inside each of us. Emotions are our weather. They tell us how we are, so we know how to address ourselves.
Most of the time we try to solve the outside issues first. You didn’t go to grandma to strategize. You went to grandma because she made you feel better so you could get back to what you were doing.
Have you ever noticed that once you start feeling badly about one thing, you’re inclined to make a list of bad things that all feel similarly? Then, you try to problem-solve and get nowhere but find more problems.
Solve yourself first. Find your inner grandma, bro.
Grandma energy is always-there-for-you energy. Doesn’t matter if you even had a grandma. Grandma energy is both present and unattached because wisdom has given her perspective, like the space between generations.
Bring that presence and spaciousness to your own problems.Grandma has the wisdom that comes from seeing so much. She knows problems are solved with the right salve.
Grandma is in the same place, at the same time, every day. You know where she is and what she’s doing. In the morning she’s ambling out to grab the paper. Early afternoon, she sits in that chair to watch her show. The same pie comes out of the oven at the same time when you visit.
My great Aunt Rhoda was my grandma figure and roast chicken was her pie. My dad’s parents died when he was young, and mom’s mom survived a holocaust escape. Those memories really haunted Grandma Shirley when she was older, so Aunt Rhoda would look after me when my parents travelled.
Aunt Rhoda was my dad’s aunt and helped raise him. They lived in Brooklyn. My dad was the only Jewish kid at Poly Prep Day School in the 1940s. He took multiple subways back and forth, and fit in as best he could, a standout athlete with light hair and eyes.
In the 80s, Aunt Rhoda lived with her sister, Mary, on the Upper East Side. Both of their husbands had passed away. The apartment had New York parquet floors, a pocket kitchen, and small tables with many framed photos. They slept in twin beds in the one bedroom.
Aunt Rhoda’s grey hair was always woven into a nest, like a soft helmet. She kept a handkerchief literally up her sleeve. I was her favorite. She told me. I don’t think I’ve had Jello since Aunt Rhoda made it.
She let me watch Wheel of Fortune with her after school, and one year got me Nike Air Max sneakers for Hanukkah.
I was in my second year of college in LA when Aunt Rhoda passed away. She left me ten thousand dollars that I spent immediately on a car.
I was in a tough relationship with someone I loved who had demons I did not understand at 20 years old. We lived in an apartment on a street that wound up from Westwood Village, crested at our sidewalk, and then descended West.
The apartment had a big outward-swing french window with six panels that looked out onto the small courtyard where the mailboxes were. I had a very heavy desk in front of the window that I bought from a vintage furniture shop.
I didn’t cry when I first found out that Aunt Rhoda passed away. My dad had been keeping me updated and I knew it was coming.
A couple days later my girlfriend and I had a tough day. I remember curling my arms around my knees in the corner of the bedroom closet.
I thought about roast chicken and cried, and cried.
I have core memories of listening to the Aquemini cd in my room.