Crosspost "I [22M] anonymously deliver greeting cards to my grandmother [77F] from my deceased grandfather. I feel guilty about lying to her about it. Should I tell her the truth?" from /r/relationships:

Hi. First off, I want to say that I’m not trying to brag or draw attention to my good (at least that’s the intent) deeds. I’m having some turmoiled feelings about this.

A couple of years ago, my grandfather passed away. His widow, my grandmother, lives alone, doesn’t receive company often, and doesn’t have any non-relative friends other than a scratch-off ticket machine down the street from her house. She often brings up the fact that she is lonely and misses my grandfather.

After Grandpa died, I went through his garage to see if any of his personal belongings had sentimental value to me. He gave me the go-ahead to take whatever I wanted before he died. My Grandpa was a mild hoarder and kept everything--case in point: bills from the milkman in the 1950s and every pair of shoes he ever owned as an adult.

Buried deep in the garage, I found a box full of greeting cards, all of which are addressed to my grandmother from my grandfather, written at various points in time throughout their 50 year marriage. Since making this discovery, whenever Grandma's birthday or their anniversary rolls around, I pick out one of Grandpa's cards and place it in her mailbox when she is away from the house. She enjoys reading these cards again all these years later--she has explicitly stated as much.

Grandma is deeply religious and believes that this is Grandpa's way of communicating with her from Heaven. Note: she understands that these cards aren't materializing from nowhere. She understands that there is a living human being behind this; she just thinks Grandpa is sort of arranging this by motivating the person (me) and providing them with the means to do it. She does not know that I am the one orchestrating this.

Every time I do this, it clearly makes her happy. She calls everyone she can think of to tell them about it. However, she also always asks if they are the person that left it. This invariably includes calling me, and I lie to her every time. She wants to know who, but I don't want her to.

I just feel that taking the curtain away would detract from how special it is to her, whether she knows it or not. I feel like revealing myself would be to make the act about me and my good nature, and not about Grandpa and their love for one another. I hate that thought. In my head, I'm doing this to make her happy and to honor Grandpa (I know with certainty that he would have loved this idea). But I do feel guilty every time I lie to her about it.

The only people who know I'm the one behind this are my dad and a close friend of mine. My dad thinks it's great, but my friend said I'm toying with an old woman's emotions and need to stop. I don't see it that way. Am I wrong?

I plan to keep doing this anonymously, but I wanted to hear your input in case I am, in fact, ass-backwards on the matter.

• Is it morally wrong for me to do this card thing altogether?

• Is it okay to continue retaining my anonymity?

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tl;dr: I found a box full of cards my deceased grandfather wrote to my grandmother. On special occassions, I anonymously deliver a fitting card to her house. She likes this, but wants to know who’s behind it. I refuse to reveal myself. Is this wrong for me to do?

 

Edit: I feel so much better about carrying on with this after seeing your kind, thoughtful, and encouraging responses. Thank you so much!


Posted by SilphiumWhite | 7 May 2018 | Link