In Memory Of “Bonnie” Boyd Campbell.
I run down the garden path.
The smell of the freshly baked banana bread streamed out of the kitchen and into the garden. And there she was, standing at the back door with her arms wide open waiting for me. Her hugs made all my childhood worries melt away
The mingle of cigarette smoke and perfume I still remember.
She was there for me in everyway, always smiling and always waiting for me when I went to her place. A bad day at school was left behind at the gate.
This wonderful person was my Grandmother.
My grandmother would then walk me to my mother’s car so I could kiss her goodbye when she went to work. We would stand there and watch her get into the car and drive away. As the car moved down the street we would stand and count the seconds until she went around the corner. We would then look at each other and like two giggly teenage girls with the biggest secret we would then we would smile, jump into the air and yell” Yay, she’s gone!
We would then run back into the garden to the warm freshly baked banana bread. My Grandmother also added a little sprinkle of sugar on top just the way she knew I liked it. We would share the bread and talk all afternoon…

Now I stop and think about how it’s funny how you can once have something and then it’s gone. It’s hard to believe how this wonderful person who was once there is not there anymore.
The journey that I still go through is the one of living my life and to always remember the most important person in my life.
For four years she fought for her life with the one thing that stopped her from doing the things she loved the most…
Cancer
It was a cold July night. At 7 o’clock she went into a deep sleep that no one could be woken from and then at 730 she was gone so now my journey starts on living the life that she wanted me to have.
On the day of my grandmother’s funeral I went with my father and there we sat for the last time to say goodbye. Sitting there in silence was really hard and to know that the person that was once there in my life was gone, faster then a flash. But I was not sad. I sat there listening to her story, of the things that she did and the people that she helped through their lives. I began to understand the reason why so many people loved her.
I saw a lot of picture of my grandmother in her young years and of my family which made me think even more about that person that I had lost and then I remembered one thing that I was told by a friend on the night she died “You only lose the physical part of them but not the memories of that person”. During the funeral my Auntie got up and said that we should be happy for the life she has lived and that my she asked for one thing before she died, she said “Don’t cry because im gone, be happy for me because I will be with my husband and family and wear bright clothing and please play the bagpipes one more to get heaven know that another Campbell is coming home”. Once she was finished everyone sat there looking at one other and smiling.
As they pushed the coffin away I took my last walk with my grandmother by her side, listening to the bagpipes playing thinking of all the times I spent with her and also what my life would be like without my grandmother.

A few days later the ashes of what was my grandmother came back in a plan metal urn. I sat there in silence looking at this urn that was once empty, thinking of what to do and where to put her to rest. I thought of all the places that she loved but I knew of the one place that she loved that most.
I took the metal urn of my grandmother’s ashes and walked down to that one place she wanted to be. As I walked tears bean to run down my face and then I knew that this was the first time it hit me about her, about my grandmother and how she will always be with me in my hear, my memories and that I will think of her always.
I reached a pair of large steal gates and walked on to soft green grass, still crying I walked over to my grandfather’s grave and there I open the lid off the urn with my grandmother’s ashes and sprinkled the remains of her over my grandfather’s grave saying “ I hope you are happy now”.
I stood there watching the sun set over the Warby’s with my grandparents and then I walked home.