Think of the dead grandparents. Middle school graduations and bar mitzvahs are included. On soccer fields or piano recital halls. The ordinary shared moments include dancing to Baby Beluga, making banana bread, watching The Wizard of Oz, and cuddling at the monkeys flying part.
The grandchildren are sad and think of everything they will miss. The wide embrace, the rapt attentiveness, the patient rereading the same book over and over again. Two years into a raging epidemic that disproportionately kills the elderly, the grandchildren have lost a piece of their birthright: the feeling that they are completely and completely loved. It was the parents who made the child feel loved, but to my mind, that glow is what grandparents provide the best. Not even the most devoted parent has the time to care for a doting grandparent.
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