Jul 19 22
When we knew our grandmother, on our father’s side, she was a wholly solitary woman. She lived alone in a tall, remote and fairly antiquated farmhouse. But in a previous time, long before we were born, she had been married to a dairy farmer and horse trader (our grandfather). For most of her adult life she cooked 3 meals a day for 6 dirty men. Our grandfather and his brothers were strange — they laughed and labored hard — but something gothic and disturbed lorded over their existence. The odd demeanor was visited squarely on our father and his brother; and there is clear unfortunate evidence within us as well.
From about the age of 3 up through around 12 we visited Grandma Sally every summer. There was no more farm, just a blackened dilapidated barn and acres of tall grass. A freight train ran through Sally’s back field. When it came through in daylight it was a joy to count the cars — when it rode through at night it was a grim procession of shadows moving across the ceiling. The latter of which we saw from our side of Sally’s bed; we always had to sleep in her bed when we stayed there. We hated it immensely.
At some point on our trip our father and Sally would sit down at her kitchen table with an old cookie tin. Within were clippings of obituaries of those that had died in the county, the year previous. These chats seemed annoyingly mystifying to our mother and pushed her out to the back porch with a cocktail.
One summer evening, probably about the age of 7 we were in Sally’s living room. We were standing, vacantly looking at the television in the far den, absently rocking an empty wooden rocking chair. Sally came in and sat on the adjacent sofa. In her quiet, inward-facing voice she said “You know you shouldn’t do that.” “Do what?” “Rock a rocking chair with no one in it.” We stopped moving. “When I was, about your age. I went to a summer fair. There was a fortune teller. I can’t remember anything she said except one thing, never to rock a rocking chair with no one in it — it brings in evil spirits.”
Of course we don’t generally go in for such loose and groundless admonishments, but in reflection, we are inclined to think it quite true.
From about the age of 3 up through around 12 we visited Grandma Sally every summer. There was no more farm, just a blackened dilapidated barn and acres of tall grass. A freight train ran through Sally’s back field. When it came through in daylight it was a joy to count the cars — when it rode through at night it was a grim procession of shadows moving across the ceiling. The latter of which we saw from our side of Sally’s bed; we always had to sleep in her bed when we stayed there. We hated it immensely.
At some point on our trip our father and Sally would sit down at her kitchen table with an old cookie tin. Within were clippings of obituaries of those that had died in the county, the year previous. These chats seemed annoyingly mystifying to our mother and pushed her out to the back porch with a cocktail.
One summer evening, probably about the age of 7 we were in Sally’s living room. We were standing, vacantly looking at the television in the far den, absently rocking an empty wooden rocking chair. Sally came in and sat on the adjacent sofa. In her quiet, inward-facing voice she said “You know you shouldn’t do that.” “Do what?” “Rock a rocking chair with no one in it.” We stopped moving. “When I was, about your age. I went to a summer fair. There was a fortune teller. I can’t remember anything she said except one thing, never to rock a rocking chair with no one in it — it brings in evil spirits.”
Of course we don’t generally go in for such loose and groundless admonishments, but in reflection, we are inclined to think it quite true.