Freedom Part 2

The next night, I went back to the cemetery.
I had no choice; it felt like something was drawing me there. Something I needed to see. Something I needed to get closure on.

My heart about leapt out of my chest when I saw a ghost. Not just any ghost -- but a ghost that looked like the pictures I saw of my paternal grandmother, Jamie Jolina.
As most of you reading this blog know, I've been wanting to 'meet' her for a very long time. Reading her journal and hearing about her from my dad and others, she sounds like a fascinating woman.
So, even though there isn't much that actually frightens me, understandably, I was a ball of nerves when I walked up to her ghost. I've only had very limited experience with supernatural creatures, even those with prior blood ties to me.

"Do you know who I am?" I asked her.
"I know exactly who you are," she said. "You look like my son -- and you look like me."
"Really?"

I found out she'd been flirty, a party animal, and a bookworm. Which explained a lot, really. It explained my dad. It explained Noah. It explained Sebastian. And it explained me. But I had so many more questions for her, many more than I had time to ask. For it was nearly five a.m. and the ghosts return to their slumber then.

While I was talking to my grandma's ghost, my grandpa's ghost was standing off to the side. He cleared his throat to make sure he got my attention.
When I saw the outline of his face, I thought for a second that I was looking at my dad.

When I realized that standing before me was the ghost of the family founder, my grandfather Nigel Plumb, I quietly gave him my best curtsy before he flashed that same lopsided grin and that same twinkle in his eye. He explained my dad, too, as much as grandma does.
I wondered what my grandparents would think of my mom. They'd died before my dad even met her.

I walked in the house at six-thirty that morning. By then I was starved and knackered. But dad was as wide-eyed and bushy-tailed as ever while eating leftover ratatouille from the night before.
"Morning, darling," he said, "have a seat."

"So, what grand adventure have you been up to lately?"
"I haven't been on any adventures."

"Savannah --"
I cannot lie to my father. I get away with doing it to my mom, but I cannot do it to my dad, because he knows when I'm lying right away and he looks at me, not with anger, but with disappointment.
"Savannah, I know you. When you were little you used to come from the forests past Pinochle Point with scrapes all over. Have you been looking for rocks down at the cove?

"Nope."
"Have you been exploring the catacombs beneath the cemetery?"
"Nope."
"Have you been at the art gallery, bookstore, or the theater?"
"Nope."
I didn't have the heart to tell him the truth. I didn't have the guts to tell him I'd talked to Aunt Margaret and I'd talked to his parents. I couldn't tell him I have grandma's journal. I couldn't tell him about the family scrapbook project I started.

Instead, I changed the subject. I talked about everything BUT what I've been up to. I'm just not sure he's ready for what I've been up to. How's he gonna deal with a daughter who spends more time with the dead than the living?
"How's your new symphony, dad?"



He perked up. "Lovely, dear, thank you for asking." He went into his soliliquy about contraltos and half-notes, and I was reminded yet again how much he lives and breathes this stuff. He once told me that he loved the idea of putting together notes that don't seem to fit -- and making them sound harmonious.
But he wasn't thrown off track one bit. "Savannah," he laughed, "I know you've been up to something. When you're ready to tell me, I'm here."
With that I went into my room (well Aunt Margaret's) and I pulled the covers over my head and went to sleep.

Daddy Dearest -- Part Two

First off, before I begin this part, I wanna say that before my dad became a teenager, he and my grandma watched my grandpa pass away. It was a traumatic experience for the both of them, and until she died, when she wasn't in her work uniform my grandma only wore two colors: burgundy and black.


When my dad was my age, it was tough for him, by his own admission, and Aunt Margaret confirms this. He and grandma were not seeing eye to eye on a lot of things, and he felt like a stranger in his own house. It wasn't any better at school either. He was called names like faggot and queer because of his fair skin, blond hair, and shy, sensitive demeanor. It got to the point where he quit going to school altogether, and he'd spend his days in the park, playing his guitar in front of whoever would listen, or at the theater listening to symphonies and concerts.


The day my dad turned teen, my grandma gave him her most prized possession: her treasured guitar. It was as if at last she figured out that a) that she didn't have much time left and b) how serious my dad was about music.
In order to fund his music (and, he also admits, to meet girls), he got a part-time job at the local spa. I think he got the job to prove to the guys at school that he wasn't gay. He started working out (something he still does) and there, he says, he met his first girlfriend, Erin Frio. He also says he never actually talked to girls (he was too shy to), that he'd compose a song for them.


Dad scrounged up the money from his part-time job to take painting lessons downtown without his mom's knowledge, but though he liked to paint, music was his first love. He redecorated his bedroom in his favorite color, much to his mom's chagrin.

Come to think of it, when it came to dad, there wasn't too much that grandma was happy about. Her only son had long since dropped out of school, and he was spending his days playing guitar for pennies and pleasure in the park and folding towels at the community spa, all the while honing his strategy for winning the hearts and minds of women all over town. But of course, she didn't know that part yet.

Hello! Introducing the Plumbs

My name is Savannah Plumb, and my family is "Just Plumb Nuts!"

I know I sound like I'm at an AA meeting or something, but I gotta tell ya, it's pretty hard being the only sane person in your entire family. And when practically the entire town is your family, that's saying something.

This man is my paternal grandfather, Nigel Joseph Plumb. Seems like a nice enough guy eh? Well, to hear my Aunt Margaret (more on her later) tell it, he came over from England at the tail end of the Great War and settled down into a nice comfy farm up in Riverview.

Here he is as a (younger) man with Aunt Margaret's mom, Carolyn Finney Plumb. She and grandpa split up way before I was born and way before my dad was born, too. After he split up with her, he packed up everything (including Aunt Margaret, who was a teenager at the time) and headed south and east, to Sunset Valley.

This is my Aunt Margaret when she was my age and about the time she moved here with my grandpa. Even then, she was writing books. She got her first novel published a few simdays after she arrived in Sunset Valley.
Here's where it gets real interesting. Shortly after my grandpa arrived in Sunset Valley, he met this woman.

Her name was Jamie Jolina. I've heard she was of French descent. He met her while they were both working at the local hospital. She was a surgeon, he cleaned bedpans when he wasn't at his farm. Who was she? She was my grandmother. To hear my dad tell it, she might as well have been superwoman.
At any rate, I don't have the whole story. But from the bits and pieces I've been able to glean from Aunt Margaret and other sources, my grandparents hooked up, and my grandmother was shocked to find out she was pregnant. My grandpa asked her to move in, and my grandma, who pretty much was used to living her own life and lifestyle, turned him down.

The day before Valentine's Day, my grandma delivered my dad. On Valentine's Day, grandpa showed up to my grandma's house with a bag of diapers in one hand and a box of chocolates in the other. Grandma had named him "Jamar Jolina," but grandpa didn't really like it. So he asked her for a list of alternatives, and they all went to City Hall and changed his name to Nathan. So the name on his birth certificate read Nathan James Jolina-Plumb.

I've been told I look a little like my grandmother. I wish! She was gorgeous, lol.

Speaking of my grandma, she was a 'party animal.' What I mean by that is, she was very outgoing and loved to laugh and have fun. She surrounded herself with a lot of people. Aunt Margaret says she used to spend her evenings in deep discussions about a lot of creative topics like art and music and books. What I would have given to be a fly on the wall at those gatherings!

Grandpa lived a much slower life. He spent most of his time with plants rather than people. Aunt Margaret pretty much kept to herself, in the company of her books, so he was pretty much free to tend to his vast orchard. After he left his job at the hospital he devoted himself full time to the orchard.