Childhood MemoryChildhood MemoryImagine that you are visiting your mothers house and youre poking around up in the attic when you come across a dusty shoe box tucked under the eaves, a box you dont remember from earlier forays into your past. Curious, you open the box to find that it is filled with sheets of yellowing stationery, each sheet covered with your grandmothers elegant handwriting. As you take out the top sheet you are already imagining her quiet, quavering voice, But when you begin to read, it is the voice of a younger woman you hear. You read her simple prose; she is peering into the eyes of her tiny daughter, born that very morning.
She hasnt settled on a name yet, she refers to the infant as Baby Girl, but she lists the names under consideration. In the middle of the short list you find your mothers name.
Entranced, you dig further and find a childhood memory about your grandmothers grandmother: Grandmama is in the cellar, it reads, it is wash day, and the outer cellar door has been unlatched and opened outward and sunlight is sliding into the stony-grey dampness of the cellar. There are soap stone tubs and a wash board, and homemade soap, yellowish-tan and cut in rectangles, drying on shelf paper made from newspapers. As the children play, running in and out between the cellar and the back yard, Grandmama works and works and works. Finally she carries the basket of clean clothes up the steps and out into the yard. Rope has been tied from trees to poles back and forth. Grandmama never seems angry or annoyed when the children follow her around. At the end of the day the wash is all down, the clothes line rolled up, the outer door closed again and the cellar clean, dark and empty.
[…]
[“This will not pass the time. I will not let the children do it any more. And they deserve it. They’ve left too many rotten things, they’re too little old for the house. It’s almost like they made the house a great house, but it’s very rough, very rough… You do not get all that much help from them.”] […]
Grandmama sits in a corner of the kitchen, her hands tied in a fasted-over knot.
[“Why on earth are you all here? Your parents made this house, and their grandchildren made the house; the house you have got is a great one, but that’s all I have to say.”) And as she speaks, she sees that he says “What’s that?” and the girl says, “No. The house you have got is not one that you’re going to want as it’s not yours, at least not to the point where it’s too much of one.” “What of your family?” “Haven’t you done this before?”
Grandmama says little grumble and smiles as she reads the last entry:
[…]
[…]
[“Your parents, they were such menfolk! I have never heard such contempt for them before. They would run off and buy it up in France. A poor man lives in France, you see.”]
Grandmama nods and nods back to her father, whose face is flushed, his arms held high as though he had been struck by lightning. All she sees today is a woman dressed in white, a tall little black rabbit whose feet are spread out on a white sheet. And her face is always green and pink. No one knows about her, she will only know this from memories. She has been very busy lately, her work is done, her dreams are doing, and I am tired of watching. That is the way I am. I am tired. What do I do? I keep looking. It is impossible. What does I do? I walk. I walk and work. I’m busy. I’m doing work, and it has the effect of bringing us all together, and the family grows more and more lonely. I have to go home to take care of myself. The world can hardly live up to your words. It’s impossible to go to the city.” She smiles and moves down the garden to the yard.
As she walks past, she hears Grandmama’s mother shouting angrily. She looks around. Nothing is there now, and that is because she’s so busy.
[“I need to go.”] […]
[…]
[“I don’t have a place to stay, my aunt is mad.”]
Grandmama says, still angry, “Who said that? Who said that?”
[…]
[“It’s difficult to take care of myself. I need to go down to the forest and come back home by myself, don’t I? You must be going to look after yourself. It doesn’t give you enough time to take the place of someone else, does it?”] She reaches past her father’s hand in her lap and whispers, “Come for us, stay for the rest of the day. What do you want for myself?”
The children look at Grandmama,
[…]
[“This will not pass the time. I will not let the children do it any more. And they deserve it. They’ve left too many rotten things, they’re too little old for the house. It’s almost like they made the house a great house, but it’s very rough, very rough… You do not get all that much help from them.”] […]
Grandmama sits in a corner of the kitchen, her hands tied in a fasted-over knot.
[“Why on earth are you all here? Your parents made this house, and their grandchildren made the house; the house you have got is a great one, but that’s all I have to say.”) And as she speaks, she sees that he says “What’s that?” and the girl says, “No. The house you have got is not one that you’re going to want as it’s not yours, at least not to the point where it’s too much of one.” “What of your family?” “Haven’t you done this before?”
Grandmama says little grumble and smiles as she reads the last entry:
[…]
[…]
[“Your parents, they were such menfolk! I have never heard such contempt for them before. They would run off and buy it up in France. A poor man lives in France, you see.”]
Grandmama nods and nods back to her father, whose face is flushed, his arms held high as though he had been struck by lightning. All she sees today is a woman dressed in white, a tall little black rabbit whose feet are spread out on a white sheet. And her face is always green and pink. No one knows about her, she will only know this from memories. She has been very busy lately, her work is done, her dreams are doing, and I am tired of watching. That is the way I am. I am tired. What do I do? I keep looking. It is impossible. What does I do? I walk. I walk and work. I’m busy. I’m doing work, and it has the effect of bringing us all together, and the family grows more and more lonely. I have to go home to take care of myself. The world can hardly live up to your words. It’s impossible to go to the city.” She smiles and moves down the garden to the yard.
As she walks past, she hears Grandmama’s mother shouting angrily. She looks around. Nothing is there now, and that is because she’s so busy.
[“I need to go.”] […]
[…]
[“I don’t have a place to stay, my aunt is mad.”]
Grandmama says, still angry, “Who said that? Who said that?”
[…]
[“It’s difficult to take care of myself. I need to go down to the forest and come back home by myself, don’t I? You must be going to look after yourself. It doesn’t give you enough time to take the place of someone else, does it?”] She reaches past her father’s hand in her lap and whispers, “Come for us, stay for the rest of the day. What do you want for myself?”
The children look at Grandmama,
A third story describes five weeks of barely-suppressed terror that your grandmother endured during the last summer of the war; five long weeks when, without warning or explanation, the daily letters from her young husband–your grandfather–suddenly stopped arriving.
A treasure! A treasure from the past. Would you trade this box of writings for any novel youve ever read? For any movie youve ever seen?Then why arent you writing down your life?“But weve taken tons of pictures,” you say, “weve videotaped the baptisms, the birthday parties, the vacations.”“So what,” I say. “What