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Show Page B2 — THE DAILY HERALD, Provo, Utah, Thursday, May 9, 1996 Grandparents’ love can’t be replaced Brotherlikely won't By DEBRA-LYNN B. HOOK Knight-Ridder Newspapers My children never bounced on their grandfather's knee. He lived far away, and even when we did get up to visit him in the nursing home where he lived, he was severely withdrawn, shut down in his ownreality after the death of his young wife years ago. Mercifully, Grandpa Jim died this past year, on Christmas Day, at the age of 74. As for my children’s remaining grandparents, two are long gone Grandpa Jim’s wife didn’t live through her own children’s graduation from high school. My father died five years ago when my son was 2 1/2 and my daughter hadn't been conceivedyet That leaves my mother — “Tytee,” my children call her. Tytee sends greeting cards addressed in lacy writing and boxes overstuffed with clothes from the second-handstore andtoys for Christmas and birthdays. She phones on special occasions and every other weekend and talks football with her grandson and baby talk with her granddaughter. She asks me, “What's the lat- est?” And I can hear hersettling in ping off the children at grandma’s games to watch his onthe other end ofthe line while I tell her about some antic or another, about how one grandchild won an award at school and the otheris growingtall. She laughsthe lilting laugh of a woman whose love for her grandchildren rivals their mother’s. And then she sighs, andI do, because Tytee lives 800 miles away. We see each other once a for the weekend. 1 know this is storybook. Those same friends say those nearbypareats interfere and tryto tell them howto raise their children. | need to accept the fact that along with couples having babies later in life come grandparents who aren't going to be around as long as they were when we were growing up. | year, if that know our mobile society is a fact I don’t think my children know oflife, that extended families can’t what they’re missing. live as close as they once did. I Sometimes Is a flicker of knowthere are plenty of other peolonging in their faces, or maybe ple in mycircle of friends who it’s just confusion, when one of love my children, But I also know too well the their friends talks about going across town for Thanksgiving or unique sound of Tytee’s voice Christmas at Grandma and Grand- whenshetalks to mychildren. And pa’s. I can’t help but fantasize about I'm the one wholusts, for a what it would be like if she lived retreat around the corner where a near. Even better, what if we had had grandmother waits with an ample p and a fresh batch of cookies, even alittle time with four of her? wherea grandfathersits with a botWould my father have taught tomless pocket ofnickels and two his grandsontore-finish furniture fishing poles propped against the with the same broad hands he back door. passed along to him? How would I don’t feel jealous when I hear this man whogave life tofourgirls friends talking about the new have looked when he methis first house orcar they just bought. I feel and only granddaughter? Would jealous when they talk about drop- Grandpa Jim have gonetobaseball . the one who looks so much likehis father who looks so muchlike his? What would my children have called their other grandmother? Would she have thought, like the rest of us, that her granddaughter has her own daughter’s ways? Mostofthe time,like a lot of us in the absence of grandparents, we find waystofill in the gaps. But on the third day of Christmas,sitting on the front rowof 3 memorial service with my arm linked in my husband’s, with my son’s soft head against my shoulder and my daughter's fat hand in mine, I cried. Not just for Grandpa Jim and the tragedy of his waning years. But for all the grandmas and grandpas, for all the cookies and nickels andfishing trips and base- ball games that might have been, forall that good lovelost. Debra-Lynn B. Hook is the author of “Bringing Up Mommy: The Tender Years” ($9.95, Andrews & McMeel Publishing Co.). You can reach Hook by writing Knight-Ridder/Tribune News Service, 3206 Alsup Drive, Columbia, Mo., 65203. Don’t give up yourturf in the workplace Knight-Ridder Newspapers AP Photo Keep going An okapicalf struggles to get to its feet minutes after it was born at 11:41 a.m. Tuesday at the San Diego Wild Animal Park, east of Escondido,Calif. The calf's mother, “Kenge,” watches. The new calf is as yet unnamed. It is the 19th okapi born at the Wild Animal Park and Kenge’s eighth. There are only 92 okapi in zoos around the world and the number of okapis in the wild is unknown. Womenface being alone more than men BY JANE GLENN HAAS Orange County Register Alone. Recently I wrote about my friend, Dave. alone at 48 “IL feel sorry for your friend.” said a caller whoidentified herself only as Margaret. “But being alone is more a problem for womenthan men.” Forty-one percent of women 65 and older live alone. Twelve mil lion mothers are single. And that doesn’t count the women who are living alone by choice The problems associated with being alone — loneliness and iso lation — are magnified for women if they don’t have coping skills and enough money to be comfortable Many older women, forinstance. do not have sufficient incomes to live well alone. Morethan one-fifth live on incomes below the stringent Poverty line $6,729a year “For the current generation of older women at least, it was assumedthat they would gain oldage security through marriaage,” says Dr. Robert N. Butler, director of the International Longevity Center at Mount Sinai Hospitaal, New York But when a spouse dies, often the bulk of the pension and Social Security benefits dies also, Butler says. The longer these womenlive. thegreater the likelihood they will be poor . That's the downer stuff The flip side is the way women are taking charge when they are torced to live alone or be the responsible spouse than young women. On the other hand, younger women, those 25 to 35, are often more reluctant to ask for heel. So the net result is that both groups of womenfeel alone.” These womenneed to dothings with the same attitude menhave, Sprinkle says — they learnbytrial and error. “Women haven't learned they have the same freedom to make errors “So I tell women, whenthey approach a problem, whether it’s replacing the innards ofatoilet or handling a financial matter, use a male yardstick. Trial and error.” You are not alone just because you are home alone, Patricia Sprinkle tells these women in her new book, “Women Home Alone Learning to Thrive” (Zondervan The corporate jungle: Don't give up yourturf at work without a fight. And if you find yourself in doubi, take more, not less,ofthe pie, National Business Employment Weekly recommends. James Larson, a sociologyprofessor at the University of North Dakota at Grand Forks, says that “organizations almost never punish turfviolators.” His view: “They wait to see who winsin a turf contest, then they embrace the winner and forget the loser. It’s a sort of law of the jungle outthere.” Moneytalks: If you gave your temps flowers or candy for Secretaries Day, you were wayoff base. A survey of temporary workers sponsored by American Express and Career Blazers, an employment firm, found that 73 percent of temps interviewed would rather have had cash or some kindofgift certificate than a token present. Some of the temps said they've received some real dogs overthe years frombosses. Among those reported in the survey were socks, a whistle, and, oddest ofall, a sandbox. Softer landing: The bad news is that corporate layoffs continue. The Older women who have never coped tend to be more dependent Lor than Lobe Bear Ann Landers: My husband stash away some years while he's been attending college in another state. Dean have always wanted to do, and mother, $9 and divorced, has money on a regular basis so been supporting my 38-year-old when the time comes, you will brother, “Dean,”for the past 20 be able to do the traveling you pay someone to look after holds two master’s degrees and your mee if necessary. Dear Ann Landers: What has been working on his Ph.D. The school told him he could with engagements, weddings complete his doctorate in six months because of previous research, but four months have passed, and Dean still has not settled on the subject matter. Every month that goes by costs my motheranother $1,000 My father stopped sending Dean money years ago, saying he was old enough to support himself. Meanwhile, my mother worksa lot of overtime. She says Dean will eventually pay back all the money she has given him, but she hasn't kept track of howmuchthatis. Ann, mybrotheris obviously a careerstudent. He's afraid ofthe reai world and will probably stay in academe forever. | don’t think my mother is doing him any favors by supporting him. Occasionally, Mom hints that she would have peace ofmind if she were sure that | would support her whenshe gets tooold to work. My husband and I have labored hard and long to get where we are. When weretire, we'd like to travel a bit. It’s depressing to think we might not be able to have someofthese pleasures in our golden years because we will have to take care of my mother. My husband and ! believe Dean should take care of Mom He owesit toher. AmI being selfish? Is it unreasonable to think Dean has a greater responsibility here? Please advise me. — Frustrated in Pensacola,Fla. Dear Pensacola: Of course Dean has a greater responsibility, but don’t count on him seeing it that way. And don’t count on Dean repaying the money he has accepted from your mother, either. I suggest that you and your Say Happy Mother's Advice Columnist. aan and graduations just around the corner, we have made some new gift rules at our house. Perhaps you might like to pass them along. Here they are: Until you have written a thank-you note, you cannot: wearit, showit, read it, watch-it, eatit, spend it, play with it or use it. Sign me — Someone Who Has Given Gifts and Received NoAcknowledgment(Indiana) Dear Someone:I like those gift rules. Wouldn’tit be wonderful if more houses had them? (P.S. For parents who clip columns for their children, this one is a keeper.) Dear Ann Landers: | was invited to the home of a coworkerfor lunch. That morning. she phoned to say another guest was bringing a friend,” and her table could seat only four. She asked me to come after they had eaten. I was offended and made an excuse about pot being able to comeat all, How would you have responded? — Amarillo Dear Amarillo: 1 weuld have been completely upfrent and told her, “Thank you, but the invitation no longer interests me.” That friend needed to be taught something about decent manners. You lost a good opportunity. O Bring Out the Little Girl good news is that most of those Americans whodolose their jobs are spending less time on unemploymentrolls than previously, a new federal report maintains. In addition, the Council of Economic Advisers says that more thantwo-thirds of the jobs created in 1994 and 1995 paid better-than-average wages. In Your Wife or Mother Buy her an original signed edition Faith, Hope* or Charity Doll. Hope, a Centennial Girl of Utah “Centennial Doll Day with a bouquet ry“a from i Publishing House, 1996) repay mother’s money ‘Cogkies Lollipops 375-8122 Sitoyoat:Pom HOLY COW LTS MOTHERS DAY! Utah Co. Favorite Holiday Craft Show! wGreat Gifts! *ttome Decor! Designer T's Wole-Ceramics! Hot Breadsticks! P& Rec Center 2 East 200 So PL Grove University Mall, Loc Phone: 765-1810 CD Ue oeme |
