May, 2009
Summer with Gram…….
Growing up I didn’t get to spend summers with my grandparents. The Summer of ’08 I met my new “Gram” and all that changed. Here are a few things I learned that summer…..
The Clothesline:
I grew up in Utah part of a crazy Mormon family. I had done my share of laundry; hanging clothes in the sun, sprinkling shirts with water then rolling them up to be steam-ironed later. I learned to iron sheets & pillowcases and had matched more than my fair share of socks. Oh yeah, I’d seen a clothespin or two in my day. However, hanging clothes wasn’t as easy as I recalled. I suppose it’s not like riding a bike, I guess you DO forget. Gram helped me remember.
It began one beautiful summer day in Ohio, the perfect day for sitting outside and watching your clothes dry. The jeans and T-shirts washed, I was ready to hang the clothesline and let the sun-basking begin. Gram handed me the rope and showed me the little hooks I should secure it to and then she went inside. I stood on a patio chair and stretched up, wrapping the line around one hook. I moved the chair to the other side of the garage door and began the second …...the back door came swinging open… “Oh no, no!” said Gram. “That is NOT the way.” The line does not drape across the front of the garage door! It swoops from the garage, down the driveway to wind around the hook fastened at the back porch. Uh, yeah….I KNEW THAT! I tried to make a joke and play it off. Gram didn’t buy it. She watched me tie the line. I slipped into the house to get the clothes. (I have it on good authority she re-tied that line while I was gone and may have mumbled something about me not knowing how to hang a clothes line.) I wasn’t off to a very good start.
Gram knew I clearly could not be trusted and she sat in her chair on the porch to oversee my progress. She pointed to the bag of clothespins in the corner. Oh, oh. Remember when I said I’d seen a clothespin or two in my day?? Well, I meant I’d seen the kind with those spring-thingys. There were wooden objects in here I had never mastered. I think they were the first ones ever carved from trees! Gram was watching me. I searched for the spring-pins and luckily found a few. I took a deep breath and reached for the first pair of jeams. I did my wet-jean-shaking ritual and then, I performed a gold-medal-winning move in Gram’s eyes……..I turned them upside down to hang them by the legs and not from the waist. The crowd went wild and I was saved! My confidence restored, I hung those clothes like a seasoned housewife waiting for her pot-roast to cook. Not even those foreign pins were a challenge. I made my way down the clothesline then sat back and watched my items swaying in the breeze. Gram smiled.
I learned a lot that day. To be honest, I am just like Gram. Things are to be done a certain way. Our way. You can’t just come in and want to hang the clothesline in some random, willy-nilly fashion. There is no need, order has already been established. Don’t go throwing clothespins at others if you can’t use them yourself.
And yet, remind me that next time “I” get to be the one re-filling the bird feeder and not the one under Gram’s watchful eye….(though, I have it on good authority that more than a little bird food was spilled AND wasted that day!)
Watering the Lawn:
You’d think this task wouldn’t be difficult. You get the hose and it sprinkles bits of H2O on the grass and viola!, the lawn is watered. Not so fast there Skippy…..
You have obviously never seen Gram’s lawn. By the end of the summer we swore she probably had 10-12 acres, easy. She had 70,000 different types of flowers and 42 strains of each. Some bloomed during the day, some at night and some in between time just to throw us off. In the morning they’d be kissed by glistening dew only to dehydrate the moment Gram began walking the yard to survey her terrain. We liked to call them “Gram’s Little Shop of Horrors”.
The initial lesson began one quiet evening. Gram said the key to irrigating was to leave the water falling in place for 10 seconds and then move to the next patch. No problem. Piece of cake, right? This was finally a task that would be peaceful and allow for relaxation.
Gram had a watering hose about 3 miles long, yet it was never really long enough to adequately reach the side lawn, from either the front or the back yard. She had a nozzle on that hose that could dial 32 water delivery methods but, you never really quite found the right one. Not a one of them could water the plants bordering the neighbor’s house without spraying their home as well. You couldn’t soak the flowers lining the driveway without getting the car wet. This may be where a Horticulture Degree comes in handy!
Over our watering days, Gram surveyed all of our trials and errors. We were sent back to our task more than once that summer and missed a conference call or two due to our lack of water-sport experience. I don’t think we killed any plant life though, so that will look good on our resumes.
You know now that I think about it, we should have just watched Gram water the lawn. It’s not like we could supply useful input. She’s the one who created this landscaped wonderland. Though, I guess maybe we should have tried a little harder. After all, even God had a day of rest.
Grocery Shopping:
As most people do, Gram makes a grocery list. She keeps it under the placemat at her spot at the kitchen table. We had errands to run and adding this shopping just seemed natural. We received directions to her grocer and off we went.
We completed our tasks and decided it didn’t make sense to drive all the way to Gram’s store. After all, groceries are groceries right? (I believe we all know the answer to that question.)
List in hand, we entered our chosen store. We made our way up and down the aisles, crossing items off as we placed them in our baskets. We patted each other on the back at our wise shopping decision. We added items not on the list that we knew Gram would love and never buy for herself. With just a few things left to buy we were surely proud of our domestic ability. And then…there was salmon.
Who knew salmon came in so many different sizes and brands? Red Lobster only serves one kind of salmon and it’s a seafood restaurant! Of course the brand Gram specified was nowhere to be found. We chose a label that started with the same letter as the one she wanted and hoped she wouldn’t notice. Neither of us spoke as we pushed the cart to frozen foods.
When people say bad things happen in threes, they MAY be talking about groceries. We were like a renegade florist that had no permission from the customer to substitute ordered items…..yet, substitute we did. We assured each other repeatedly that she wouldn’t mind one single bit.
Our spirits were dampened but we trekked up and down the aisles. If we had been playing baseball we’d have had more strike outs than Reggie Jackson in his 21-year career. Who on earth knew they sold low sodium lunch meat? I mean, besides Gram that is. We loaded our cart with “bells & whistles” you know, the groceries to use as diversionary tactics. We piled our goods in the car and headed back to Gram’s.
As we unloaded the food into the kitchen Gram “ooooh’d” and “ahhh’d”. She repeated over and over we were spoiling her and we should NEVER have purchased so many delicacies. But, she smiled every time we unpacked another bag. We scrunched up the plastic sacks concealing the store name where we had shopped and buried them in the trash can outside. We took deep breathes. We did good.
It wasn’t until the next morning Gram cornered us (separately, of course) and inquired about our shopping venue. It seems while she was making cinnamon raisin toast that morning she had read the name of the store on the bread label. Are you kidding me? After all that? A stupid bakery label threw us to the wolves! No way!
In our defense, I would like to state that we never once told her we didn’t go to her usual store. Nevertheless, I have banned my support of raisins forever…I don’t care if they ARE on cereal boxes and can sing and dance.
In Summary:
As you can see, it was quite the summer. I think I missed a lot growing up but that summer with Gram gave me so much. I hope we returned half of the love and joy (okay, and entertainment) that she gave to us. Now, she is my perfect Pen Pal.
Gram’s birthday and mine are one day apart. Coincidence, I think not. She may be a slight woman but, she’s lived a tough 94 years and has big shoes to fill. I hope I always make her proud. (Though honestly….. I AM a bit nervous when I think about NEXT Summer. I may need to start working on my watering technique!)
It’s true I may not have spent my life with Gram, but the memories she gives me will surely last a lifetime. I love you Gram.
