My grandmother Mary Becker died on Novemeber 30, 2007. I was deeply saddened at being unable to be with my family during that time, and I wrote this piece to be read at her wake service. Since, many family members have asked me for copies of ‘’my letter’’ and so I thought I would post it here.
In many ways, Grandma’s death has influenced my time in Mozambique for the last couple months too – I often draw comparisons between our simple lifestyle here and that of Grandma’s early life. I’ve told the sisters and my friends many family stories that otherwise would not have been recounted. I feel much more connected to my family; Aunt Paula has been scanning and sending me old photographs unearthed for use at Grandma’s wake service. I have an old pill bottle on my desk with Grandma’s obituary and a flower from her funeral that my dad sent from the U.S. with Matt at Christmas.
A few weeks ago, on my 23rd birthday, I went out for a morning run. As I ran along the quiet National Highway 1, I noticed a small yellow butterfly flitting along beside me. Intrigued by the way it wove in and out of the plants, but continued to follow my path, I began to imagine that perhaps this was a little ‘’Happy Birthday’’ sign that Grandma had sent me – looking down at me , as a friend wrote after Grandma’s death, through her new direct window on Mozambique.
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What can I say about Grandma? My Grandma whose name I proudly carry. As I sit alone at my desk in a hot, humid room 10,000 miles from the only place I want to be right now, it’s hard for me even to put into words how I would characterize her – what I would say if I were sitting among you with the chance to stand up and say my piece.
I guess what I most want to say is: Grandma was very special to me. When I think about my own life, she is one of a few people who have influenced me more than anyone else. Even as a small child, I knew there was just something special about her. Once, when I was about five years old, I heard someone mention that Grandma was getting old, and she had done something to remind them that she might not be around forever. It so upset me that I ran into my room and shut myself into my closet. I sat down in front of the cardboard shoe organizer inside and wrote on it in big, child-letters with black permanent marker, “I love Grandma Mary” – my little prayer to God that she would be around to take care of me forever.
My best memories of Grandma are from 10 or more years ago; those days are becoming fuzzy now in my mind. As a small child, I spent every day at Grandma Mary’s house while my parents worked. I loved Grandma’s house for its peacefulness. The house started each day dark and cool, warming as sunlight crept in slowly through the dining room window, inching across the buffet table to bathe her small potted violets in a warm fuzzy radiation by late afternoon. Each day, Grandma made me honey toast or a bowl of cheerios for breakfast after my dad dropped me off. Then, she would begin making bread or noodles or some type of dish for dinner, and commence the household chores for the day. I would sit at the kitchen table and watch, asking lots of questions. Why did the bread dough get so huge when it sat in the special cupboard for an hour? Why did the sheets and pants and shirts get hung to dry on the outside clothes lines, and the underwear get hung on the clotheslines in the basement? Why did Grandma scrub the floor on her hands and knees when Mom and all my aunts used mops?
I remember her sitting me at the kitchen counter with a bowl of chili that I proceeded to pick all of the beans out of. I remember “helping” her pick rhubarb and running in among the billowy sheets as she hung the wash out to dry. I remember standing atop “the stool” with my arms straight out to get measured for each year’s Christmas-present pajamas. I remember Michael chasing me around the house until Grandma scolded us, and Hans and I building card-house villages and running to get Grandma to look. I remember the great meals – Turkey and mashed potatoes (she always called me out to the kitchen to “lick the beater”), the wilted lettuce with bacon, homemade macaroni and cheese on Fridays. I even loved the peanut butter and honey sandwiches she let me have for snack (when I promised not to tell my father).
Most days, we had several visitors at the “Do Drop Inn:” Grandma’s lively sisters who talked so fast I didn’t have time for questions; Aunt Jean who came once a week on her lunch hour to perm Grandma’s hair; Grandma’s quiet sister, Ceil, who always seemed a little bit sad. No one ever left Grandma’s house without a loaf of bread in hand. I don’t think I even saw a loaf of store-bought bread in my own house until I was 12 years old.
Some days I went with Grandma to church in the morning. She usually picked up a few friends who couldn’t drive, and dropped them off the way home. Sometimes, we would do other errands – often taking a casserole or loaf of bread to someone whose husband was sick, or whose mother had died.
Grandma was always busy, but we also had a lot of fun. She was constantly working – I learned something of that work ethic during those days for which I will be eternally grateful. But, she always stopped working to watch our afternoon shows. Dennis the Menance, I Love Lucy, or, as my mom reminded me yesterday, Highway to Heaven. Grandma was very taken with Highway to Heaven. I remember her commenting sadly every day about how Michael Landon – the man who played an angel interceding in the lives of wayward humans – had recently died of cancer. How intriguing to me as a little kid that the angel in the show had actually died in real life. My mother tells me that she used to come in and find Grandma and I both crying at the end of a particularly touching episode.
Grandma had so many stories that she told me, usually as I sat at the kitchen table watching her bake bread. She would knead the dough 20 times or more sprinkling the flour on the table, punching the dough in, the wrinkled skin on her hands covered in crusted dough, and what muscle was left in her arms rippling with each punch. Grandma told me she started baking bread when she was nine years old. She told again and again the story of “Matchew” and his uneaten rutabagas spit into the snow; she told stories of working at the Adams company, of growing up on the farm, of her siblings and parents and grandparents long since dead – I loved to listen. I maybe heard more of her stories than anyone else – who else had that much time to sit around and listen? I wish now that I could remember them all. I tried to write some of them last spring in a small biography of her that most of you have read, but many of the stories have been lost from my child-mind with the passage of time.
Perhaps more than anything else, I think I will always remember Grandma’s eyes – pale, blue eyes the color of sky that could bore into your soul. She talked a lot, told a lot of stories, but she never had to pass many verbal judgments. Those eyes could overflow with love – sometimes literally in her small, repressed flow of tears – or they could flash with anger, with a jerk of the head, if someone said something that offended her family or someone she loved. Even in these last years when her mind mixed up what she wanted to say to us, her eyes always conveyed just how much love she had for us – her beloved children, grandchildren, family members.
So, I’m far away from you all. I wish with all my heart that I could be there right now to cry together, to laugh together, to retell the stories that we’ve heard a hundred times, and to remind each other of forgotten moments. Here, in the midst of a bunch of little girls who’ve already lost their parents, I am so thankful to have not only had my own parents, but to have grown up in the care of Grandma Mary, as well. I know that Grandma is watching over me now; I know she would be happy with the work I’m doing – it is perhaps her early influence that first put me on the path that ended me up here working with the poor. I hope that you all celebrate her wonderful life today – and I hope we can continue to celebrate it and to share these stories when I return.
Rest in Peace Grandma – I love you.
