Dear Friends and Family,
Six months ago my grandma Louise Bushman died, and I stopped writing.
I wanted to write a letter that could some how describe the person I came to know over those months I spent with her. I couldnt quite find the words at the time. And maybe im just not ready to. After she died, I had this desire to share with my family what I had learned about Louise. Growing up I had always seen grandma one way: righteous, a bit distant , and caring.
At 23 I dropped out of winter semseter of school, and moved to Arizona to get to know not just the beautiful woman that had raised my mother, but I was in search of also the yiung woman, who built my family, who was unsure, who carved a life for herself and me out of a faith that her family had left dormant.
I guess most simply, I moved back to Arizona partly to get to know the girl Louise.
This is a photo of her freshman year at Weber State College in Utah.
So here is what I learned:
Louise Bushman loves pink flowers and speaking spanish. Her bathroom is decorated with soft white towels that have pink embroidered roses on the tops and bottoms of them. A sign on the cupboard reads: POR FAVOR! Do not wipe your hands on grandmas white towels with the pink roses on them. Use a guest towell. MUCHAS GRACIAS!
She raised 8 children with Orvil Maurias Bushman and never stopped loving him.
This photo was taken on their honey moon.
They met in a post WWll cafeteria line at BYU, where Louise was attending based on the advice of some good friends who had absolutely loved their time at BYU. She transferred from Weber State and found herself waiting in long lines for everything in the months after WWll ended, due to the high return rate of G.I.s re entering school.
She hated mascara,"it bothers my eyes" but wore light pink blush and lipstick, which always looked so pretty on her.
She went to the temple once a week with her good friend Birdie. She ate pineapple sherbet ice cream religiously with her lunch.
She was terrified of water and hated the swimming pool in her backyard that my uncle and aunt had installed while living there( i cant blame them,i loved that pool)
i think the only time i ever heard disdain in her voice was when she was talking about that pool.
She loved her neighbors and knew each one by name, including the newest move-ins.
When Grandma died I asked my Aunts who were planning the funeral, if I could speak at the funeral. I wanted to express a few of these things. I wanted people to see Louise the same way I had come to see her.
So I wrote this, and gave it the day of her funeral. I hope it was the right kind of goodbye.
For Louise
Singing: Luna luna bella bella luna luna bella oh Louise quiere la luna, luna bella, bella amore.
Speaking: I'm lying next to grandma in her big bed singing her to sleep. Its our last night together before she moves to California, and I don’t yet know it, but it will also be our last time talking before she dies.
I'm singing her a song I learned while working on the Anasazi trail with troubled youth over the past few months. Grandma was nice enough to let me move in with her when Michael my brother, and I started working at Anasazi last summer. Living with grandma has been a special experience. I learned so much about her. For instance, I learned that every moring for breakfast she eats four fig newtons, and due to the advice of her friend Birdie, she has also started including in that meal one boiled egg, because everyone needs a little protein to start the day off right.
I also learned quite recently an additional part of her morning routine is to spend anywhere from an hour to ninety minutes saying her morning prayers. This prayer takes her so long, because grandma goes through and prays for each and every one of her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren (and their spouses) by name. If she knows specifics of things they need help with she will pray for that too. She and Grandpa have over 130 descendants.
I learned while spending time with grandma that she has the funniest wit. She is so dedicated in the things she does, and puts service to God on the top of her list. Her favorite scripture is "consider the lilies of the field" and her lifes motto with Grandpa was “seek ye first the kingdom of god and his righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you.”
I remember Grandma telling us one year how she went to get a pedicure. She was not really big into cosmetics or pampering herself so this was kind of a big deal. She later got a fungus of some kind on her toenail from the pedicure, but when asked about it, she just said, "oh well. I had a nice conversation with the lady who did my nails and I shared with her a pamphlet about the Restoration of the Gospel." Grandma loved the gospel, and was the type of person that did not mind being uncomfortable if it meant in the end she might have helped someone else.
At the end of grandma’s life it became hard for her to see and get around.
I remember one night the sister missionaries asked us to go visit some people with them. Grandma of course said yes. As we parked the car, and began to walk across the street to the house, grandma held onto my arm for balance. As we approached the curb I prepared to hold my arms steady and help kind of lift her up over it. But before I could even assume a stable position grandma had eyed the curb and done the closest thing to a ballerina leap off the street and onto the sidewalk I had ever seen anyone her age do. I was in shock and joked grandma “I didn’t know you were a dancer!” Without missing a beat she looked at me and said “well I didn’t point my toes.”
On our last Sunday together Brother Thornhill and Bishop came by to bring me and Grandma the sacrament. She cried as she took the bread and water. There was a beautiful spirit in the room as the blessings on the bread and water were said. Bishop asked Grandma to bear her testimony. She said “ well I just know that God loves me and will take care of me. He always has.”
I didn’t know it then, but that was the last time I would ever hear Grandma's testimony in that formal way.
On the last night I spent with her I continued singing the Spanish lullaby to her adding in each one of her kids names one by one verse by verse, till I had sung them all. Lorna. Carolyn. Melvin. Mary. Ruth. Ann. David. Johnny. She got the most beautiful smile on her face. And I knew then like a never did before that being a mother had been and is the best thing she had ever done.
A few days later I would find myself in the middle of the high desert and through a staticy satellite phone call to my boss learn that she had passed on. I hung up the phone and as I looked at the valley below me and the mountain path behind and ahead of me, I felt I was seeing life the way grandma might be. The mountain paths don’t end just because we stop walking them . They keep going and stretching on. Grandma’s influence doesn’t end just because she has stopped living here with us. It continues to stretch on through us as we live our lives, and through those she has touched through her kindness and testimony.
I think my friend Kimber said it best:
''I've never met a woman so simple in Christ. A single prayer from her was equal to the power of hundreds in my eyes. I am absolutely tickled and delighted for her that she passed away last night. She can now rejoin her eternal companion and continue to make progress into the eternities. All my time spent with Louise Bushman has been poignantly marked as a blessing.''
