I somehow forgot to blog about the fact that I left yesterday for San Diego to spend a week with my 86 year-old grandmother. She is more than a grandmother to me - she’s sort of a hybrid mother-grandmother combination, as she raised me from the age of 5 1/2 years old. My grandmother is a fascinating woman and she also drives me completely insane. “I can’t figure out if our temperaments are the same, or if they are the opposite,” she remarked today. Who knows, but we do have this uncanny ability to make each other nuts.

At 86, she continues to live on her own and manages a household. I have a lot to learn from her, as I am barely managing a household at age 32. She also has some very funny quirks. She spin-dries lettuce in the drier. She refuses to cook anything in her oven. She microwaves sponges to kill the bacteria. She insists on watching “American Idol” (or some other show) at 8 pm rather than hanging out with me and Sami. Though that annoys me, I like how she demands her own time and doesn’t compromise on what is important to her, even for out-of-town guests.

This post would not be complete without a brief description of the numerous “travel angels” that helped us out on the 5 1/2 hour journey and all the other requisite hassles of getting to the airport with a 2.5 year old. First there was the kind friend who lent me her sit-n-stroll — a quite remarkable invention. Then there were the various luggage-handlers. I never once had to lift our heavy suitcase after putting it in the trunk of our car in the morning. There was the kind man who helped me lift it up onto the shuttle-bus at the remote lot at BWI; the remarkable woman shuttle-bus driver who directed me to curbside check-in (what a saint!) and then the angel in line behind me, a father of two small children, who tipped the curbside check-in employee when I realized that I had no cash on me whatsoever.

On the plane, I realized to my horror that there was nowhere to plug in my laptop so Sami could be entertained with DVDs, and the battery sorely needs to be replaced. So DVD entertainment lasted a grand total of 30 minutes and I had less than my usual bag-of-tricks as back-up entertainment. But there was a kind woman who was returning home from a visit to her own grandkids, who gave Sami a sticker book that kept him entertained for hours. The list of kind and helpful people I encountered goes on and on, and this is confirmation for me that people are basically good and kind and want to help.

The only thing that I regret was that I basically lied to the kind grandma who asked me about my husband with the innocent assumption that we were still together. I was just too tired to answer her questions honestly, so I went along with her assumptions. I also didn’t correct her when she talked about my grandmother as if she was my mother (she hadn’t understood that I was referring to my grandmother and Sami’s great-grandmother).

So to this woman I must have seemed so normal: a married woman with a mother who is alive rather than the soon-to-be divorced woman whose mother died when she was 21. And I could almost make myself believe that I was living this married, mothered life, if only for a duration of five hours or so. Perhaps it was the compassionate thing to do, rather than to put myself through the unnecessary discomfort of explaining any of it to a stranger who probably didn’t really want to know even a fraction of the sordid details. We all had a pleasant flight, although it was not my most authentic moment. Maybe I might do good to reflect a bit on how to respond to people who assume that I am still married. Well, I am, until June 12, anyway…so it wasn’t entirely untrue. This mental jitterbugging I do makes me laugh. Blah, blah, fucking blah.

We’re here. Sami is excited about hanging out with his grandma. He screams her name about 10 times a day. I ate a wonderful authentic burrito from one of those taco stands that ends in -bertos today and then we spent three hours hanging out at the beach. Oh what an amazing feeling to find the wet sand squishing between your toes and the ocean stretching out before you like this big, dramatic high note.

I also worked with my ongoing fear of Sami being sucked away by a wave. The waves were so calm, and I stayed within arms’ reach of him at all times. Sami was oblivious to the fear and having such a freaking good time and I finally decided to join him in that state of mind. Lack of fear doesn’t mean you are careless or an idiot. It means you realize there is a potential for danger and you do what you need to protect your child, just without fear. It’s like ordering a sandwich without the mayo. What a different energy that is!

The ocean water was warm. So much warmer than I ever expected, and flecked with gold. That feels like a metaphor-in-progress for life right now. Be open to jumping in that ocean, even if you think it might be cold and uninviting. You might be surprised.