By Jennifer James
My
grandfather passed away on December 21st about five years ago. We
buried him on Christmas Eve.
It still
feels like there is a huge gaping hole in the family. He was a quiet man--soft
spoken, kind, and often he’d be sitting in his chair praying or contemplating
his own thoughts. But somehow he managed to command the room simply because he
was there.
Some
people are like that. They are like the boulders in the middle of a stream, the
one solid thing in the fluidity of everything that flows around them.
Growing
up, I loved to go to my grandparent’s because there was a play house in the
back yard, right between two large apple trees. My brother, cousins, and I had
loads of fun climbing those trees to shake the fruit off or using the branches
to get on the roof of the house.
My
grandmother had fits over the roof climbing stuff, but Grandpa enjoyed watching
us play. I’d hear him say “Leave ‘em alone, Frecks. They’re just fine.” (Frecks
was his nickname for Grandma…she’s a red head with loads of freckles. *grin*)
He’d help us gather up the apples and spent hours helping us peel and chop them
to boil down for apple sauce. No sense in wasting food.
We even
canned the apples on the wood burning stove in the living room.
Both of
my grandparents grew up on farms. My grandmother is from Tennessee, and she was
a spoiled brat of a child with her own horse. (Her words, not mine.) The small
farm she lived on grew tobacco, sweet potatoes, and cotton. She hates sweet
potatoes, and so her mother often gave her money to go into town to buy a
cheeseburger for dinner.
Like I
said, spoiled. Grandma pronounces “spoiled” as “spoilt” to this day. Every now
and then you can hear the tones of the Deep South in her words, especially when
she’s upset. Yelling things like “Jenn-ay, you get off that rouf this instant
befur y’all break yer necks!”
My
grandfather was the child of an Irish immigrant coal miner who settled in West
Virginia and a woman who was half Irish and half Blackfeet Indian. Unfortunately, his mother died when he was only three weeks old. All we have left of her is an
old faded photograph of a solemn looking twenty-something in a white lacy wool
cap and winter jacket. I like to think I got my cheekbones from her.
His
father remarried, then divorced, then remarried again to a woman who was once
divorced. Try to sort out that family tree! Grandpa ended up with twenty-one
siblings. Twenty survived to adult hood. Only one sister was his full blood
relative, and she still lives in a small cabin in the mountains of
Maryland.
His
family struggled through the Great Depression, and like many people who lived
on farms, after the war he moved to the Cleveland area where he met my
grandmother. She was thirteen at the time.
They
married when she was seventeen and were together for almost fifty years until
he passed away.
He saved
his own lunch money to give to a less fortunate childhood friend of my mother’s
so she would have lunches at school. Grandpa knew poverty first hand.
He told
me stories about killing poisonous copperheads and rattle snakes. Taught me how
to pick green beans and cook green tomatoes and collard greens and that you
never make corn bread with actual measurements. Oh, and the best way to cook it
is in a cast iron skillet. Trust me. It makes a difference.
One of my
favorite meals was fresh buttered bread smeared with warm applesauce from the
stash we’d canned ourselves.
In the
winter time I loved to sleep on my grandparent’s couch because it was directly
across from the wood burning stove. I’d wake up sometimes in the middle of the
night and see him stoking the fire to keep the house warm.
We went
to the saw mill and watched him run enormous boards through the saws in between
catching frogs and eating “Jo-jo’s” (Enormous sliced potato wedges with this
seasoning…yum) On the way home from the
mill we always went down a certain road with this hill on it that was topped by
really bumpy rail road tracks and had a great dip on the far side. Grandpa
would hit the gas hard and launch his truck over the hill so we’d have the
thrill of feeling our stomachs rise in our bellies.
After my
first child was born, despite the fact that he was on oxygen and had lost most
of his eyesight, he’d take his tubing off and get on the floor with Ashley to
play, genuinely joyful to spend time with her.
I wish
he’d lived to meet Carly, who was blessed with very distinctive ears that look
exactly like his.
Despite
their fixed income and the lack of spare money (a former coal miner and retired
house keeper don’t have big pension plans) my grandparents helped provide food
for the needy through their church’s food pantry. Because they believed that
helping others and providing for the less fortunate was a calling and a blessing.
If you gave, you’d always have enough for yourself.
We miss
him so terribly. But the memories he left us with bind us together. Each time I
meet someone who knew him, I’m honored by the amount of love and affection I
hear in people’s voices when they speak of him.
He didn’t
erect buildings or set the world on fire with headline news, but he made a
positive difference for everyone he
knew.
And
that’s something worth leaving behind.
You can
connect with me in the following places:
