My navy blue carpeted booster seat is warmed from sitting on the passenger side rear seat in the sun. My clothes are packed neatly in my mothers suitcase and my chosen companion for this weekend's journey is Samby. My Carnegie Science Center Tee-Shirt has frogs on it, and my hand-me-down patagonia nylon shorts are neon coral. Nike tube socks fill my brother's old sneakers on my feet. They will soon be kicked off. Shoes are unnecessary.
My brother takes dramamine because he gets car sick. I don’t get carsick and I also occupy my own time with conversations with the man running across the power lines and guard rail as we drive. Intermingled I recite the most impactful sonnets of our time with perfect eloquence. The multitude of imaginary circumstances traverse the 5 and a half hours it takes to get over the mountains to Richmond VA.
The traffic picks up and the skyline appears over the highway. It means we are nearing Grandma’s house. We pull into her neighborhood and pull up her driveway. Pulling in tight behind her 1994 Baby Blue Buick Lesabre. Before anything can happen, I unbuckle and jump out of the car to rush to say hello to Grandma. The smell is always the same. Ponds lotion and cold A/C in the hot Virginia heat. Every item in her house is pulled, reserved, gloriously from the decades she existed actively. A chrome rimmed table from the 50’s, a china cabinet from the 40’s, the pastel furniture from the 70’s and 80’s, and the memorabilia of my grandfather’s time in the Korean War. I run through the house peeping into all of the rooms looking for my best friend. He’s not in the bathroom, he isn’t in the guest room, he isn’t in the pink room or the bedroom or the living room. He isn’t even in the den. I pull with all of my almost three years of weight at the sliding glass door to enter through his shop to the back yard. There he is, sitting peacefully on the swinging chair.
My grandfather was a tower of a man. Granted The time frame that I knew him, I was no more than two feet tall. Even as I remember him now, I see him from that perspective. As I prance up to him, his bright blue eyes twinkle at me. His giant paws fill my torso as he picks me up and swings me onto his lap. A warrior and gentle giant, I was pressed up against the ultimate force of the heart. A grandfather. My paw-paw.
I had a sharp and cold cough as I sat in my high chair with nothing but a diaper on. I swear my parents dressed me at some point or another. It may have been pasta, or corn and mashed potatoes for dinner, all I can recall is the sharp deep cough that resonated in my chest every exhale. I recall the silence around each one as everyone tried to enjoy their meal. I recall the sound of my paw-paw creaking up from the chair and walking to the den. The clinking of glass rang out between each hack. My plate of food was handed off to my dad and brother to share and a small child sized glass of brown liquid was placed in front of me. My mom helped me swig down my first every shot of whiskey. Four Roses. Within a few minutes the coughing had turned to giggles intoxicating the whole table as I became a roaring laughter. What all I did in those short moments as a drunken toddler, I don’t remember. The last thing that happened was a glorious evening of peace as I slumped my head down onto my high chair passed out from the booze and exhaustion. My family enjoyed an evening of quiet conversation as I drifted off into Irish lullaby.
Comments