When I was in Paris, a headline in a magazine on the coffee table caught my attention. It was something about a mother or a grandmother, but for some reason, it triggered a very strong memory of my grammy.
Grammy was not my grandma, she wasn’t even a relative. She was the old women who baby-sat me and my sister Susan when we were little. I don’t remember a ton of things from my childhood, but I clearly remember so many things about my grammy.
I remember that she never watched us at home, but rather at her house, in a senior-living development in Wayne, NE. Her apartment in the one-story, courtyard cluster of red-brick buildings was tucked in the corner. And we would get out of the car on the street and run up to her door. I remember some of the old people in the other apartments would come out and watch us arrive. One neighbor couple would even get out M&M’s to try to get us to come over to their door. It worked.
We must’ve been a welcome sight for the old eyes. We were probably about 4 or 5, little blond things, my sister and I, running gleefully up to our grammy’s door.
Inside, it was a four-room apartment. It had a living room, one bedroom, one bathroom and a little kitchen. In the living room was the “davenport.” That’s what Grammy called it. It’s was an old-fashioned, scratchy-upholstered sofa that folded out into a bed for us to sleep in when my parents had a night out. That only happened a few times, but I remember them lifting us out of the bed and carrying us to the car on those few occasions.
Mostly, Grammy watched us during the day, when my parents worked as teachers. I don’t know how my mom found her, or whether she watched other little kids before or after us.
I don’t even remember exactly what she looked like and I have no picture. I wish I did. To my little girl eyes, she looked like a typical old woman with permed gray hair, a house dress, glasses. She seemed to me well-built, not frail, and kind of tall.
I remember that she made really good food for lunch. We’d have roast beef with potatoes and vegetables. She’d always mash our vegetables and pour cold milk over them so we wouldn’t burn our little tongues. And I remember once having a lemon meringue pie.
She took such good care of us. She’d always brush our hair before my mom came to pick us up. I had long curly hair and it hurt when people brushed it. But I let her do it because she wanted us to look good for our mom.
In the afternoons, Grammy would watch her “programs,” a soap opera or two. I don’t remember what specifically she watched, because we’d always go play something else inside or just outside the apartment door. Afterward, though, if Lassie or something similar came on, we’d watch a little of that.
I also clearly remember the box of toys she’d get out for us. There weren’t many things in that box, though I do remember these little, old-fashioned dolls that I’d play with. We always found plenty to do in that tiny apartment.
When we got older and went to school, we sometimes would go to Grammy’s after school if my mom couldn’t come right home. When I was about 6, my brother Mitch was born. And we started going to another older lady, whom we called Mrs. Nissen, or something like that. I don’t know why we stopped going to Grammy’s. She might have gotten too old to watch all three of us.
But I was never as comfortable at Mrs. Nissen’s as I was at Grammy’s. (Though I do remember playing with a box of empty perfume bottles there.)
A few years after we moved from Wayne, my mom told me Grammy had died. She went up to Wayne to go to her funeral. I don’t think I went; I’m not sure. I wish I’d asked my mom more about Grammy. My mom told me that Grammy’s husband had fought in the war and that he had a metal plate in his head and was never the same after he came back. I don’t think Grammy ever had kids. Besides us, that is. She took care of us as if we were her own.
I loved my Grammy. I hope I told her that often.
My Radical Sabbatical 