Grandma’s Memorial

My trip to my grandmother’s memorial last week was very nice! It felt strange to be all by myself though (i.e. with no small children). I kept looking around feeling like I ought to be keeping track of somebody other than myself and realizing that I wasn’t really responsible for ANYONE ELSE! I was glad to get back home though – I wasn’t gone long enough to really miss my men (husband and sons), but I was happy to see them again, just the same.\par
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I figured for the sake of history I should record a little about my grandmother’s memorial. My mother’s side of the family tend not to be devout Christians, so the memorials we’ve had for my grandmother’s generation (that means the ones that I actually remember) are not particularly religious. My dad has done\’c3\’82\’c2\~the praying at the last three, possibly because he’s the only one there who has much experience making public prayers. This would seem odd to me but for the fact that I have never been to a normal funeral and thus have nothing to compare it to. The memorial service generally involves burying the deceased’s ashes at the little public cemetery in Latah, WA (where my great-great-grandparent’s homesteaded) and then having a service either at the cemetery (as we did for my grandfather’s) or at the old ranch house (as we did for my great-aunt’s) or, as at this recent event’s somewhere else entirely.\par
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The plan was to have the memorial service at the cemetery, I believe, but when we all met at the ranch house, it was discovered that a pipe had broken and the plumbing was not working. My cousin is\’c3\’82\’c2\~5 months pregnant, so having an hour long service and then driving back to Spokane (for the scheduled dinner) for an hour without using the restrooms was not an option. (actually.. it probably wouldn’t have been an option for an entire party of people even if there were no babies in utero) So, we had what an uncle of mine described as “a drive-by funeral” – as in, we drove to the cemetery, deposited the box of ashes, set out some flowers, then high-tailed it out of there as fast we we could get everybody back into their cars and on the road again. My grandmother would have approved. She was a practical woman.\par
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When we got to Spokane we all had the snacks that had been intended for the gathering in Latah, then everybody sat outside on my uncle’s lovely patio next to his pool for the memorial. The service consisted of an opening prayer (my dad’s), and several songs and poems that my grandmother liked interspersed with times of sharing memories of my grandmother’s. It went well. The memories were almost entirely positive (a relief!), and the songs and poems were poignant. Here are a few of the stories I particularly liked:\par
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When we were all little we used to “sneak” down to Grandma and Grandpa’s room in the morning when we were staying with them, and have toast and visit in bed with them until everybody else got up. My cousin Becky (Rebecca) suspects that she started this trend. Her story wasn’t quite so halcyonic though… she remembered sneaking downstairs, before it was an accepted thing, and when it was really quite dark. She walked into Grandma and Grandpa’s room and stood there staring at their sleeping figures willing them to wake up. Apparently my\’c3\’82\’c2\~grandmother did awake to the feeling of somebody standing in her bedroom looking at her… and screamed. At which point, so did Becky. They got it sorted out eventually.\’c3\’82\’c2\~\par
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Also, my great-aunt Vivien remembered traveling with my Grandma Mildred in Europe. Apparently while\’c3\’82\’c2\~they were staying in Germany my grandmother took a long time coming to join them… they eventually went\’c3\’82\’c2\~to look for her and found her in the ladies room. Stuck in the ladies room, as a matter of fact, and banging on the door and yelling something fierce. They got\’c3\’82\’c2\~the landlord, who didn’t speak English,\’c3\’82\’c2\~but who eventually broke the door to release Grandma.\’c3\’82\’c2\~By the time she was out, the situation was\’c3\’82\’c2\~hysterically funny to my\’c3\’82\’c2\~two great-aunts who were traveling with her (Aunt Vivien and Aunt Dorothy), but Grandma was NOT amused. For the rest of their trip they\’c3\’82\’c2\~kept asking her if she wanted anybody to go with her, when she went to use the bathroom.\’c3\’82\’c2\~(Aunt Vivien also commented on the fact that Grandma was a terrible driver, which I can attest to.)\par
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My cousin Brian recalled Grandma’s efforts to improve him by constantly telling him to “enunciate.”\par
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My cousin Jason recalled sitting around drinking whisky and playing cards with Grandma. He said that she told he and another cousin, Rachel, that she thought they would never get married. We asked why, and Jason said, “Oh, I don’t know.. cause I was getting old and was shiftless or something.” They’re both married now.\par
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My own mother recalled how good of a grandmother her mother was. She said that she noted especially how when we came to visit, Grandma would put all of her other normal activities on hold so that she could spend time with us, figuring that she could always do those things when we weren’t here. She noted that and tries to follow her example, and I can vouch for her that she does: last time we went to Grandma Rachel’s she made green eggs and ham for breakfast one day, and pancakes for 3 days in a row after that! (this is NOT normal fare at my parent’s house, and involves a lot of stress since BOTH boys want to get in on every step of the process now!)\par
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My uncle Jerry (who has been around since he started dating my aunt when they were 16) commented that he had been thoroughly prepared to meet my grandmother by my aunt and her friends… he was expecting something along the lines of a fire-breathing dragon, by the time they were done with him. So much so, that when he actually met her, he was very relieved to find that she was indeed quite kind and polite. Her only irregularity was that she refused to fix him a hamburger with nothing on it and insisted that he eat what they eat when he was there. Also, and I thought this was funny, he said that he noted especially that she was a physically attractive person in her 40s, and decided that, yep, he could live with that in terms of her daughter. He could and he did and he has, and they are a very cute couple.\par
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If you’re wondering what I said, I just repeated the story about Judah remembering having cookies with GG, that I have posted earlier.\par
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Well, hopefully this is all I’ll want to remember about my grandmother’s memorial on May 12, 2007. Special thanks to my friend Caroline who asked me today whether I got some good notes of people’s remembrances.. I didn’t, but her question made me realize that I probably would like to have some record of the things that were said, which lead to this post! (This also explains why my comments aren’t word for word quotes… so anybody who was actually there and who reads this has to remember that I didn’t have notepaper, and I don’t write shorthand, so this is the best I can do!)