Memories of Mabel

When I got home last night, I had a message on my answering machine from my sister, telling me that Mabel had died. Mabel was my step-grandmother, for lack of any better way of saying that. She was my step-father’s mother. But really, I grew up knowing her as my grandmother (although I always called her Mabel, just as I always called my step-father Wayne), so I usually skip the “step” part of that title.

This message was not completely unexpected – Mabel was 94 years old, I believe, and had been sick for a long time. Plus I think she has wanted to die for a long time. A very religious woman, she was more than ready to go meet her maker, so to speak. And to see her son again. She never really got over his death in 1993. I was sad when I heard the news, but not overly. I didn’t cry, I didn’t feel any great loss. I hope that doesn’t make me sound cold – I loved her completely – she was always my second grandma (I never knew my paternal grandmother). But I hadn’t seen her in about three years, I think, because she has been living in South Carolina with her other son, so she hasn’t been a daily part of my life for a long time.

So no, I’m not really grieving for the 94 year old woman, who had lived a full life and was ready to die. I am, however, grieving for the woman I grew up with. I hope you don’t mind if I tell you about her.

Just as I don’t really remember a time in my life before Wayne was there, I also don’t remember a time before Mabel was there. When I was a little kid, my parents weren’t at all religious (a fact that never changed), so Mabel took me to her church for bible school. I remember her coming to pick me up, in her little car, and driving me over there way more clearly than I remember what they taught us in church.

After Mom, Wayne and I moved to Virginia, our visits with Mabel became a two or three times a year thing. She would come down to visit us – she would fly in, because even then, she was already pretty old. We’d go to the little local airport and pick her up, and she’d stay with us for a few days. We’d take her to church on Sunday, and she would dress up in her polyester skirts and jackets. Her hair was always gray – although maybe there was some black mixed in when I was still little – and it was always short and curled close to her head. She wore glasses, and she had a few moles on her face, but you never saw a kinder face in your life.

And a couple of times a year, Mom, Wayne and I (and sometimes just Mom and I) would drive to New York to visit the family, and when we did, we always stayed with Mabel. She always lived in trailers, since I knew her; first a single wide and then, later, a double wide in the park across the street from the first one. She also always had dogs, and I remember her little mini-Collies (I know they have a real name, but I can’t think of it right now) jumping all over me and sleeping with me and laying on the couch with me when I was there. I remember very clearly the feeling of sleeping in one of her spare rooms, with the window open in the summer, and the sound of cars whooshing by on the road outside. She had a radio in this room, and I would try to find a good station in this town where I didn’t live at the time, but I never had much luck.

I remember she also used to like to do crafts. There were beading projects, where she would make plant hangers and wind chimes and just pretty things that served no purpose other than being pretty. She had a whole room for her craft projects, which had lots of plastic storage containers in it, full of beads and fun things. They really captured the imagination of the little girl I was at the time.

I remember that she was a horrible cook. She couldn’t even pop popcorn without burning it, but we ate whatever she made anyway.

She had an old manual typewriter when I was a kid. It was the kind that you had to press really hard on the keys in order for them to go down. It wasn’t electric.

She was a teacher before she retired, and in fact at one time actually taught in a little one room red schoolhouse. Can you imagine? I remember that she came to my school as a substitute teacher when I was in fifth grade, right as I was moving to Virginia. I remember being happy to move before she came to teach me, because I was embarrassed to have a family member teaching me.

I remember holiday meals at her house, with all of Wayne’s family around. I remember family reunions at her house, with those same people. I remember that once she asked me what I wanted of hers when she died. I was about, I don’t know, 12 at the time? I thought the idea of her dying was preposterous, and didn’t really want any of her stuff, so I told her that I would just take some knick-knack thing she had in the living room. I remember that when she was clearing out her house and getting ready to move to South Carolina with her son, she gave things to all of her relatives who were staying behind, including to my sister (who is married to her grandson – it sounds incestuous if you think about it too hard, but it really isn’t), but didn’t have anything set aside for me. I was hurt. This was the only time she ever hurt me. I didn’t care about getting her stuff, really, but I would have loved something in my house to remind me of her, and I was hurt that when she was dividing stuff up, she only thought of the people who were related to her by blood. I was only her son’s step-daughter, so I didn’t count. Which is wrong, because I know she loved me.

I remember that when Wayne died, there was a lot of friction between Mabel and my mother, with things said that shouldn’t have been, by two women who were mourning for the man they loved and hated to lose. I remember that when I saw her at the funeral, I hugged her and told her I loved her, and she had the happiest, and yet saddest sound in her voice when she hugged me tight to her and told me she loved me, too, and always would.

She was always short, but by the time I was in my 20s, she made me feel like an Amazon, towering over her. And I’m only 5’3”.

I remember lots of things about Mabel, but mostly I just remember how much I loved her. She is the last person from her generation in our family. My other grandparents are gone, and shoot, so are both of my parents. Now it’s just me and my siblings (plus a lot of Aunts, Uncles and cousins who I don’t know or just never see).

I love you, Mabel. I hope that heaven is everything you always thought it would be, and I hope you and Wayne are together again.

Shoot, now I’m almost crying. The memories end here.