Goodbye Grandma, and Thank You for Everything

My grandmother, Ruth Blough was one tough lady, and one fantastic grandmother.

She was born in 1923, the smaller of a set of twin girls born to the Arnold family in a farmhouse in rural Wayne County.  She was tiny and I remember her telling me the story of her parents putting she and her sister in the warming cabinet above the coal stove to keep them warm.  She would tell me about chasing chickens and making their own dresses and the tough life they led in the 30s.  She always offset the stories of the tough winters and meager means with a smile about the way her father played the violin or the fun they had playing in the cellar or with the animals.  There was always this sense of balance with grandma.  Play, but after a bit of work.  Candy or cookies, “piecing” as she called it, but only after some celery with peanut butter or only long enough before dinner that we would still have time to work up an appetite. 

Playing was always serious business at grandma’s house.  It was our job when we were there.  She provided us a mission on days that the weather permitted.  Normally it was to head out, bundled in old wool hats and with bread bags on our feet (to keep them dry) with a BB gun in hand, with a mission to hunt down blackbirds.  She loved and fed every other sort of bird under heaven with the best thistle seed and songbird seed money could buy, but when those “damned blackbirds” bullied their way into the bird feeders she made sure they were met with armed resistance.    As a young boy with my posse of younger brothers and cousins in rank, this was a noble purpose to which I was well suited, and I took on the mission with gusto.  We cleaned out the birdbaths, we cleaned the many feeders around her garden-like backyard, and we learned to be aware of what grew around us and what it meant to cultivate and strengthen the “good stuff” and to fight against the things that were undesirable.  She was a strong woman, firm, no nonsense and unladylike in all of the best ways.  She could kick a ball further than any of us, she would get down on her hands and knees in the dirt to look at bugs we had found and she would sit and rock us when things didn’t go as planned on a mission.  She knew the value of dirty hands on children and we knew the love hidden in every deep wrinkle in her work-hardened hands.

On days that the weather kept us indoors there was no time for television.  We pushed around an ancient “push broom” and watered and cleaned her dozens of cactus pots.  I think she appreciated the tough exterior of the cacti and how challenging it was to keep them “happy.”  When the chores were done we pulled out “colors” and sat and created.  She drew right alongside us.  We played “poker’keeno” with pennies and always ended up abandoning the game at some point to see who could sort through the mountain of copper to find the oldest penny.  It was always an adventure no matter what we did, and she was always right there with us.  She was never just a spectator in our lives; she was our leader, our commander and our mission control.  She allowed us to shoot bow and arrows, throw rocks and build completely unsafe structures from old scrap wood.  She allowed us just enough freedom to feel dangerous and wild, as boys should.  I have her to thank for so much of who I am today and who I want to see my boys become tomorrow.

I am glad my grandma was not the “fancy one” of the twins, which for some reason she always seemed apologetic about,  and I am so blessed to have had a lifetime worth of adventure packed into Thursdays and Fridays at grandma’s.

I will miss you grandma, but my mission is clear.  I will get my hands dirty right alongside my boys and let them know the value of balancing work with some “piecing” here and there.  Thank you for investing so much of your life in us all, your grandchildren are all better people for having you as our commander and chief.  Love you.  Thank You.

Christopher John