Last Thanksgiving, we hung out with grandma.

Today, we packed up the things in her room to be donated. Our grandma passed away this morning. It was so sudden. One week we were eating clams in black bean sauce, opening birthday presents, and painting our nails, and the next she’s on an oxygen tank. It has been a stressful, traumatizing, and incredibly emotional three days. I’ve gone from frustration to anger to sadness to desperation to numbness. Today, I lost my last remaining grandparent and one of the funniest, sauciest, and strongest women in my life.

Christmas 2008.

She had the prettiest smile. Eating dim sum in 2008.

Girly girls. 2009.

Hanging out on a sunny afternoon in 2009.

My grandma and ST were buddies. 2010.

One of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do was walk into her empty room and see her possessions piled on her bed, waiting to be thrown away. Kim, Tommy, Carlos, and I packed it all up and its sitting in our apartment right now. I have every intention of donating her things, but right now, I just want to hold onto them for a little while longer. I can’t believe she’s gone. Even though her health was waning, I never thought it would happen so fast, so soon. I just wish I could spend one more afternoon chatting with her and painting her nails. I’d give anything to hear her ask me where “Melogee” was (for some reason Mel’s name was the only one she said in English) or if I was working hard or tell me to be more frugal or laugh or smile. She was one of the best things in my life.

I miss her so much.

My sisters and I grew up on the Lower East Side, in a building right next to my grandparents. They helped raise Kim and I since my mom worked the night shift. I have so many memories in that apartment.

• My grandpa yelling and me and Kim for giggling so much at bedtime.

• My grandpa buying me a slice of pizza (one of the few English words he knew) and eating my crust while my grandma ate Vienna sausages.

• Making dumplings with my grandma using this press she had.

• My grandma buying me a tiny set of ceramic horses during one of our walks in Chinatown. I wish I knew where it was.

• Watching Matlock and Smurfs while reading magazines on a lazy afternoon.

• Eating ramen and pretending I was in a Chinese soap opera.

• Giving my grandma shoulder rubs and listening to her stories about her childhood.

• Watching my grandma knit and then repeatedly failing when she tried to teach me. To this day, I can’t get the hang of it.

• Taking walks in the park.

• One time, my grandpa caught me one of those tiny brown birds with his bare hands! He put it in a cage and it went berserk so he eventually set it loose. That was one of the coolest things anyone has done for me. I’m told that he would tell everyone I was “his” Carol. I still am.

• Apparently, I cracked an egg on my grandma’s head when I was a baby as she was carrying me on her back.

She was truly a remarkable woman. So today, instead of being sad like I was last year, I am thankful. I’m so grateful to have been her granddaughter; to have been able to hear her stories, wear her homemade sweaters, and being deeply loved by her.

Lastly, I’m thankful that they’re together again, after being apart for so long.