I know it’s Wednesday today because there are green garbage bags flapping in the wind and the rain, all up and down Grandma Euphemia’s block. I remember Wednesdays were always garbage day on her street.
I am already late for my Wednesday meetings. So I know I should skip this, after all, personal side trip, but some switch inside me has just flipped, and instead I text in sick. If I can just connect with Grandma’s spirit inside her old house there I’ll be okay.
I pass the COMING SOON! sign on the patchy lawn, try the first step on the wooden front porch, grab the railing, careful about splinters, and drag myself up. The stairs bounce, but they hold me.
I wonder if my key still fits and it does. Smooth as ever. I turn the lock, walk through, close the door and cross my fingers.
I haven’t been in this house for a while. I look around the mostly empty rooms. I remember when they were overfilled and overstuffed. Family photos of people I didn’t know, knick-knacks and what-nots crammed all over the place.
In the kitchen, I see an ironing board with a torn cover propped up in the corner. What troubles and hopes had that old ironing board seen? On the living room floor, a suitcase with a broken latch, and Grandma’s ballerina lamp.
And a casserole dish, as shiny clean as could be, on the dining room table. I remember that dish. At one time it held her notorious chocolate chip omelettes.
My memories of us together -- of what she’d say and how she’d say it – lingered with me over the years but had become faded and fuzzy, overshadowed by my new enthusiasms and nightmares and flat out go-for-broke busyness.
Today I feel again, for the first time in too long, the loss of listening to Grandma’s clear voice. Today is my last chance to look around.
I remember our Sunday suppers together when I was a kid. Meat you had to cut with a knife, whipped potatoes and gravy, and a mixture of green peas and carrots and corn. Too many peas. Not enough corn. The silverware laid out just as Grandma said. The spoon on the far right was for dessert which was always my hope for the meal.
I’d start our Sunday supper routine together, look up from my plate and say, “What was thus and such like in your day, Grandma?” And she’d smile back, look over her glasses, “My day? Today is my day, honey. Here with you.” Then she might say something like, “Now sit up straight, dear.” But most often it was, “I know peas roll around on your plate, but you don’t eat peas with a spoon. Use your fork, young man.” Grandma could always make me smile. “Rules are not made to be broken. Whoever said that wouldn’t know a rule from a mule.”
