Remembering Granma
The table in her small kitchen was red with white squares,
and the chairs had chrome legs and soft red cushions. It was where I sat
sometimes after school waiting for my mom to get home from work. Granma lived alone in a small cottage where
grand kid after grand kid came to visit when parents worked late or needed a
night out. It was where her grown children came to talk about the fairness of
life, or the injustice, take your pick. She was a good listener and during her
lifetime I bet she mended more than socks, but many hearts with her gentle
ways. I remember walking with her to her place of work that you could smell a
mile away. it was the smell of ice-cream cones being made. It was a sweet smell
like cooked sugar that grew stronger with each step we took. Back then a kid
could walk all around town without any worries about much of anything. Doors
were always open, and the only rule was to be home in time for supper. My walks
with Granma were filled with stories about her life and questions about mine.
She would tell me about the time she worked in the circus, where she met my
grandpa who I never got to meet. He was a band leader and she a tight rope
walker. They eventually married and had four children, leaving the circus, and
starting what she called a somewhat normal life. My mom told me that her dad
was a drinking man who liked to gamble his paycheck away leaving my Granma to
fend for herself usually by cleaning someone’s toilets and watching their kids
all for some money for food. Grandpa wasn’t a nice guy when he drank, and grama
was who he took it out on blaming her for having to many kids to feed. He died
a few years before I was born from liver disease, and it couldn’t have happened
to soon. Forgive me God. I have so many
wonderful memories of her, the way she smelled of white shoulders perfume and
her long white hair she braided on top of her head. I remember her talking to
me in her gentle voice, always trying to tell me more stories of her past so I
would know where my roots came from. It was long before any DNA tests, so it was
her relying on her memories that she shared with me. She’s been gone a long
time now, as are her children but her memory burns deep inside of me and brings
a smile to my face every time I smell peanut butter cookies baking, a hot apple
pie cooling on the window sill, and especially when I walk down the street to
the now abandoned ice-cream cone factory where the sweet smell of sugar cooking
fills me with happiness that she was a part of my life I will cherish forever.
I wish she could have met my children but sometimes I see her in one of their
faces when they smile her smile or ask me questions about her. They sit
memorized as I share her stories of circus life, leaving out the parts her heart
was broken. Id show them pictures of her dressed in her costumes looking so beautiful
and graceful as she walked the tight rope with a smile on her face. I know
someday we will meet again because she told me we would, and Granma never once
lied to me. Until that day, I will think of her often and listen to her gentle
voice as I drift off to sleep with a smile on my face and the sweet smell of
ice-cream cones forever etched in my memories of my Granma.
Mike 2023
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