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Lynn Roberts
1989
 

    My grandmother lived through the depression -- hard times, barren fields -- the womb not so barren. Too many mouths to feed, but she managed to stretch a dollar when she had one, as well as a hand to wandering hobos. "There's always plenty," she would say, and there was, of poverty.
    My grandmother lived in an old, stoic house full of antique furniture with sinister claws, a dirt cellar which I hated, and a porch swing I loved; curious rooms framed with ancestors and covered in quilts -- colored bits and pieces borne from the rag bag and shaped into stories. Her hands were red from washing and plowing and digging and mending, though they never felt rough. White hair, curled on strips of tin, wound into a bun, her "crowning glory" she called it. When with frustrated tears I'd try to manage my own, she'd soothe it into braids.
     She started Old Bedford Church in the middle of nowhere, "where two or more are gathered in the name of the Lord", hitching up horses and arriving early to build a fire that would take off the chill while snow blew and piled outside.
     On Memorial Days, we took cut flowers in buckets of water to the cemetery; peonies, lemon lillies, gladiolas and purple iris all fed by a yard that nourished such things as rose bushes, lilacs, tulips, snowballs, and fruit trees, one of which held my swing hidden in my special place. We'd set these flowers in glass fruit jars against a wilting sun. Walking the uneven earth and kicking at cactus plants, I learned the litany of my own origin written in stone. "Your great grandmother on the Grantham side", "Your Uncle John Hinshaw", "Your Aunt Ola, mv sister, died before you were born." (Somehow I missed Aunt Ola who seemed closer than Uncle John or great grandmother Grantham). Past and future slanted over me and we walked carefully around them. "Are you afraid to die?" "Why, no, honey", she smiled. "I'll be glad to go home to God."
    When my father left, I sat in my grandmother's kitchen, perched on a stool, sorting out spices and complexities, watching her make strawberry turnovers. Elbows white with flour, wisps of hair trailing her face, her energies propelled the rolling pin. Punching dough smartly, she created words. "You have a father, you know; a heavenly one, for you are a child of God." Handing me then a piece of dough to chew on. Not that she couldn't later reach forward from a pew to yank the ear of this sacred body so that it sat up straight with propriety.
     She lived to be 100; to every century there is a season. Trading seats on a horse-drawn wagon for one in a horse-powered car (no one ever drove fast enough to suit her), to ride the friendly skies -- now there was something fast!
     I went off to college and got smart; at least a paper and square cap said so, and I lost sight of her for years. I tended my own affairs, both literal and figurative, and Sundays were for sleeping in. Good music was loud music, and free love, paid for later, could be had by all.
    Grandmother died and was buried in one of the worst blizzards ever to hit the land. People talked of it for years. Of her, they spoke little, death being the way of things.
    I couldn't go to the funeral, being away at some convention or other, but I sent a nice wreath, expensive too. I did well on my job, got several promotions, even bought a townhouse, all brick and modern with not one piece of claw-footed furniture in it, though I did buy an antique frame the other day on a whim ...
    I don't know just when I began to think of strawberry turnovers or just why I restored the old quilt that had lain in a trunk for years. Nor could I explain why the sudden sight of a peony bush or a lemon lilly would sting my eyes and stop me short
    When I went home to visit, the Old Bedford Church was gone and in its place was a gas station, a few houses and a small sign that proclaimed "New Bedford." The old cemetery had new gates, a marbled entrance, paved roads and smoothed lawns. Gone were the dirt paths and cactus plants, except farther back in the older section. There were the pillars of great grandmother on the Grantham side, and Uncle John Hinshaw, and Aunt Ola ... and my grandmother, leaning, but sturdy.
    There was a kitchen fragrance in the air, though I knew it must be the newly mowed grass, for even here, the lawn was tended, but for some subtle nagging at my feet. Stooping, I found a cactus plant, withered, but still living. I plucked it gently, turning it over, amazed it had escaped the mower's blade. "Are you afraid to die?" I whispered. "Why, no, honey. I've gone home."