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Nov. 3rd, 2002
I.
When my grandmother said again, after the wedding, and again, how it had been so nice to see her son in a suit and she didn't know when else she had ever seen that, or would, I didn't say that it would probably be her funeral, or my grandfather's.
II.
My grandfather's hand shakes too much now for him to do art anymore; his last enthusiasm was birdhouses, diners and mansions and St. Basil's assembled out of bottle-tops and Christmas ornaments. His earliest pieces were mosaics. He showed me the very first one on the back porch and explained it to me, the devil (a sort of Assyrian winged dog thing) leading the people away from Christianity (a fish), or maybe towards, it wasn't entirely clear, and I never did figure out what the key and the swan meant before we got cold and had to go inside.
He showed me his diary, a wall calendar with a sticker or bit of picture cut from a magazine pasted in for every day, showing something that happened that day - a dollar sign for the bank, the Krogers logo for the grocery, a church for church. Since my family's arrival was blank, the days too busy for him to sit down and pick something out.
III.
Despite thinking in pictures, and being told at the last minute, my grandfather gave a wonderful wedding toast. I can't remember exactly what he said, except for "may your house be free of tigers", which was the perfect thing in context. At my grandmother's birthday party three days later, he danced a little, gently, when we all got up and did the Twist during the skit of my grandmother's life. When we sang Happy Birthday at the end she said she felt a little overwhelmed and beamed at us tearily, five children, four spouses, three grandchildren, two cousins, eighty years.
When my grandmother said again, after the wedding, and again, how it had been so nice to see her son in a suit and she didn't know when else she had ever seen that, or would, I didn't say that it would probably be her funeral, or my grandfather's.
II.
My grandfather's hand shakes too much now for him to do art anymore; his last enthusiasm was birdhouses, diners and mansions and St. Basil's assembled out of bottle-tops and Christmas ornaments. His earliest pieces were mosaics. He showed me the very first one on the back porch and explained it to me, the devil (a sort of Assyrian winged dog thing) leading the people away from Christianity (a fish), or maybe towards, it wasn't entirely clear, and I never did figure out what the key and the swan meant before we got cold and had to go inside.
He showed me his diary, a wall calendar with a sticker or bit of picture cut from a magazine pasted in for every day, showing something that happened that day - a dollar sign for the bank, the Krogers logo for the grocery, a church for church. Since my family's arrival was blank, the days too busy for him to sit down and pick something out.
III.
Despite thinking in pictures, and being told at the last minute, my grandfather gave a wonderful wedding toast. I can't remember exactly what he said, except for "may your house be free of tigers", which was the perfect thing in context. At my grandmother's birthday party three days later, he danced a little, gently, when we all got up and did the Twist during the skit of my grandmother's life. When we sang Happy Birthday at the end she said she felt a little overwhelmed and beamed at us tearily, five children, four spouses, three grandchildren, two cousins, eighty years.