“Mame is the Boss of the family because she is the oldest.”
“Were dinosaurs around when she was little? No, I mean in zoos?”
“I taught her how to make peanut butter and fluff sandwich!”
--Matthew
quotes about his beloved Mame
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| This tree used to have branches from the bottom all the way up to the top. It used to be my favorite climbing tree. |
The place that I remember spending the most time as a child
is at my grandparent’s house, which has been my grandmother’s home for the last
sixty eight years. My mother is the second youngest of her five children, as I
was the second youngest of her six grandchildren. Out of her three
great-grandchildren Matthew is the second youngest.
Allow me to give you a virtual tour both of the home. First thing
to know about my grandparents that they are huge cat and dog lovers. So if you
pull into their driveway, the same driveway that I learned to ride my bike
without training wheels on, you might see her current cat Boo greet you from
his favorite spot – the top of a car roof. When leaving be careful to check your
car for Boo if you left your windows down.
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| This is Boo |
When he was alive my grandfather (Papa) could usually be
found in one of these three places; sitting in the garage enjoying a beer, feeding
table scraps to dogs (not always ones that belonged to him), or picking
raspberries from the wild bushes near the woods. During Sunday dinners (which
were served closer to lunchtime) I was forced to eat all sorts of weird things for
a child like sauerkraut and pork, asparagus, and baked potatoes from the oven instead
of microwave loaded with butter stored at room temperature. To my grandmother fast
food is when you buy shells from the freezer aisle to make stuffed shells.
After dinner Papa would usually relax in his leather recliner to read the
newspaper or watch sports on their small television with just the basic cable
stations. Beside his recliner he had a bowl of Werther's candies which he doled
out to the grandchildren who inevitably gathered at his feet as soon as we
heard the noise of the wrapper.
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| Mame used to keep Tootsie Lollipops in there. I am sure that was its intended use. |
We call my grandmother Mame. An older cousin was the one to
choose it for her for reasons unclear at the time but the name suites her. Mame
means pearl which according to Wiki has become a metaphor for something very
rare, fine, admirable, and valuable. I asked her which room in the house was
her favorite and her first response was none of them because they have all
become cluttered with age. When I pressed her she admitted that it was her
bedroom.
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| That is some groovy wallpaper in my aunt's old bedroom |
Set apart from the other bedrooms, with its own kitchen,
walk in closet, and private entrance the bedroom is where my mother recalls
Mame spending most of her time when she was younger. She was an avid knitter and
many of the drawers, bins, and boxes in various places through the house are
stocked with yarn. Recently my mother and I were exploring the kitchen and
found all sorts of old miscellaneous items such as a box of Christmas cards
from the 50’s, a game called Scribbage (which came home with me – the vintage
game is a perfect addition to our game closet), and a parenting book which
strongly discourages breast feeding as a “trend”.
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| A section about this so called breastfeeding |
There are now million dollar homes down the road from the
house where there used to be a cow pasture. I learned to count on those cows
and it was always a game to see how many you count when driving by. For now the
pastures of empty land behind the house remain empty. As a child I earned my
badge of bravery by poking large bullfrogs with sticks in the pond, climbing (and
falling out of) trees, and eating crab apples right off of tree branches. I am
the living proof that crab apples are not poisonous. They are an acquired taste
however because to this day my mouth still waters at the memory of how tart
they tasted.
Now my grandmother is a proper lady who plays cribbage and
knows how to jar cucumbers to make pickles. She would be mortified to know that
I blogged about her dirty book collection kept under her mattress. She worked
at a book publishing company and used to bring them home for Papa to read. When
my mother asked if we ever found the books, like she and her siblings once had,
I told her that only unusual book that I recall was a dictionary of slang words
Papa kept by his recliner chair for laughs. It is no wonder I was an early
reader– as soon as I was old enough to sound out words I was thumbing through
that dictionary.
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| Would you like a proper cup of tea? | | |
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There were plenty of none dirty books in the house too. In
fact my friend Cindy and I once pooled all the Laura Ingalls books, Black
Beauty, To Kill a Mockingbird, and several other classics from shelves all over
the house to store on bookcases we dragged into my mother’s old bedroom. I
spent an afternoon making library cards for each book. Thus The Liberty Library
was born. For years I would play in that room when I visited and was very fussy
about people taking books from the room without me dating their cards first. To
this day Mame still calls the room ‘The library’ even though the books have long
since disappeared and the room functions as a guest room.
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| An old doll we found in a closet |
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My mother’s favorite room in the house is the dining room. Between
the kitchen and the three season porch it is the smallest room in the house but
she and I both recall everyone crowding in to eat at the table together. On one
side of the table there was a long bench which the bingo markers, crayons and
coloring books were stored inside Only
if the grandchildren were really bored would Mame let us color with her bingo
markers. I once blotted a misspelled sign that read ‘Mam’s kitchen’ and a heart
underneath it which she hung in her kitchen for at least twenty years until the
yellowed corners rolled up. Mame taught all her grandchildren how to play Go
Fish, Rummy, and Solitaire at that table.
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| Plates pictures of the their church on the wall of the dinning room |
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There are some things in that house that do not have a
story. For example the oil painting of a white woman wearing a jeweled
headscarf on the wall near Mame and Papa’s bed. Mame can recall the full name
and address of the high school aged boy who wrote my aunt Gretchen a love
letter that we found wedged under some spools of thread on a high shelf, but
suspects the painting might have been passed down from her mother-in-law. Gretchen
now lives in North Carolina where she will be receiving an old love letter in
the mail any day now.
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| Mystery painting |
It is impossible to leave without Mame giving you some fruit
to take with you. A banana for Sammy seeing she only has a couple teeth, green grapes
for Matthew because they are his favorite and watermelon for my mom because her
horse likes the rinds. Papa use to give me raspberries to take home by the
quart and I recently thought of him while raspberry picking with the kids at a
farm
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| She caught on amazingly fast! |
I hope that you enjoyed your virtual tour of the home. On
your way out you may find that it is easier to drive over the lawn to the
street (really, it is fine!) than trying to back out of the driveway onto the
curvy back road. Just remember to check for Boo!
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| One of Sammy's first visits to Mame's house |
