Hunter and I were sitting at the dinner table, he pulled up in his high chair, me on the side to his left. Shawn's food was across from me as he was getting ready to join us.

I looked at the surface of the table: scuffed and worn from too many years of neglect, the remaining vestiges of last night's yogurt fest adding a new layer to the design.

But I didn't see the scars. Instead of just having one of the end flaps raised, I saw the table opened with leaves inserted so all 6 of us -- my parents, my mother's parents, my brother and I -- could sit together for dinner. The tablecloth was white and every place was neatly set. I was sitting in my mother's place -- as a girl, I always sat facing the living room with my back to the French doors that led out to the patio. Sometimes, quail would come to visit outside those doors, burbling coos as they promenaded on the roughly laid brick.

It's odd how, as an adult, I see my grandparents as so much more human than when they were alive. It's been over ten years since they died, but my memories -- those glimpses of how they acted and what they did -- hold so much more meaning now that I am old enough to understand. I wish I could have been able to have been there for them as more than just the role of Darling Granddaughter; I wish I could have given them understanding and acceptance and love of who they were as people, not just My Grandparents.

But I couldn't. Even the concept of that sort of connection was foreign to me before I met Shawn, and they died before he came into my life.

I do not feel guilty.

But I grieve.