My mom’s mom died last night at 12:01, one minute after my dad's birthday ended.
At 87, she’d had a front-row seat for a staggering amount of the 20th century. She grew up in Milford, Massachusetts and years of living in New York and Florida could not make her put an “r” in the proper place. My brother once asked her what her least favorite food was, and she thought for a moment and said, “Well, I was never paahhtial to paaahhsnips.”
Her parents ran a bar during Prohibition and they’d smuggle alcohol in her and her four brothers’ backpacks. (The statutes of limitations have passed on those charges, right?) They called the bar, The Office, so if you were there you could call and tell your wife you were still at the office.
Even just a few years ago, she’d tell us stories of her childhood in a frightening amount of detail. She’d share a story about a college football game, and tell us what the score was, or when her town had their big anniversary in 1920-something, and she demonstrated the song and flag routine she did.
She almost didn’t go on a second date with my grandfather because they were the same height. They had their wedding announcement in the New York Times, which I always wanted to go back and find.
While my grandfather was at war, she lived in Manhattan, right across the street from Grand Central. Rent: $60 a month. She said she'd run across the street in her robe and slippers for the newspaper. She was so excited when I moved to New York, saying she’d get to live it all again through me.
She and my grandfather raised 10 kids on Long Island after he got home from the war, living out the American dream in a big white house on the water. It's a home for autistic kids now.
We went back to visit it after my grandfather's funeral in 1998, and my uncle, who was one of the younger kids and felt perennially overlooked. He was so excited to be back as an adult to share it with his kids and nieces and nephews. However, the entire trip went thusly:
We go to visit their old neighbors, and the little old lady greets him with a huge smile.
Old lady: Dermot!
Uncle: No, it’s Liam.
Old lady: Oh, I thought you were your brother. Want to come in anyway?
She then proceeded to give all of us teenagers children’s books to read, with the admonishment to wash our hands first.
Here’s the tour we got of the town:
Uncle: I used to buy candy at this gas station up here! (Turn corner, no gas station) What? Oh come on!
Uncle: We’re coming up to this stone wall I used to walk on coming home from school.
(Pause as we turn corner) How can they remove a whole wall?
The trip reached its sad but somewhat inevitable conclusion when we turned the corner to see his old room and discovered that the room literally ceased to exist – the wall had been taken out and the door was plastered over.
When my grandfather retired, they obeyed New York state laws and migrated to Florida, like good grandparents do. She did some sort of Catholic ministry work with single moms in jail, which led to lots of hilarity along the lines of “Grandmom’s in jail again.” Those were happier times.
We played board games with her once, although she never quite embraced the concept of “teams” and would just shout out the answers she knew, so we switched to Scattergories, where you have to write your answers. (There’s an assigned letter and everyone has to write a word starting with that letter in a category.) This lasted only as long as “Four letter word starting with T” when she got distracted, apparently thinking of other four-letter words she knew. And wrote “Fuck.” What more do you want in a grandmother?
Since I was 2, whenever we’d sign off on the phone, she and I would end with “Amen sister.” I don’t know where it came from, but we did it for almost 25 years and it was something just the two of us did.
There are already three girls in our family who have Isabel in their name, and I’m sure there will be many more to come.
She was a good lady.
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