I Also Remember

Over the last few days many have posted their memories of when they heard that President Kennedy had been killed. I was a junior at Alabama College in Montevallo, Alabama. One of my courses in Vocational Home Economics involved refinishing furniture. I had just applied warm oil to the beautiful walnut chair frame when someone came into the lab with the news. It seemed as if the world stopped and everything moved in a blur. Yet I continued to rub each section of the chair with a soft wool cloth until the oil was absorbed, finding the simple repetitive act of buffing the smooth wood somehow soothing. Fifty years later I remember that hollow feeling, and sometimes when I sit in that chair I find myself stroking the smooth wood.

As powerful as that memory remains, it was the news of the death of Robert Kennedy that has the most connection for me. My grandmother was visiting, and the two of us were watching television together when the news broke. She gasped and said, "Oh, poor Ethel, with all those children." To understand fully, you need to know that my mother, the eldest of five children, was only eight years old when her father was killed. When a former employee of her father came to the door, she and her brothers clustered around grandmother and heard her tell the visitor when my grandfather would return from an appointment. The man left, but walked only a short distance from the house, where he waited out of sight until my grandfather returned. He shot him at close range. My grandmother never mentioned how difficult it must have been for her, not only lose the love of her life, but to rear five children in a depression era world. In her softly spoken "Oh, poor Ethel with all those children" she revealed perhaps more than she realized. Her expressed empathy came from an understanding that most of us will never understand. When I think of the Kennedys, I remember, and am grateful for, the resilience of my remarkable grandmother.

  

In Gratitude

I've noticed each day that many are posting on Facebook short statements about things for which they are thankful. Somehow I never seem to get the memo that these daily things are coming. However, I'd like to share a longer selection that I read earlier this week at my writers club meeting.
     

I Am Thankful…….    

 I am thankful that my mother loved to read, and especially thankful that she read aloud the poetry, plays, short stories, and other writings that were part of the junior and senior high English curriculum. My earliest memories of when she read to me as we snuggled on the sofa are of a highwayman “riding up to the old inn-door” on a horse whose hooves went “Tlot-tlot; tlot-tlot.” Of a raven who seemed to say only a single word: nevermore. Of a story that left unanswered the question: “the lady or the tiger?” As a child I did not realize that often she was reviewing for one of the six different classes she taught daily. Little Golden Book picture books, children’s Bible stories, Mother Goose, and other children’s favorites were among our usual fare, but even with their beautiful illustrations those books were no match for light brigades and ancient mariners.

 Because Mother shared her enthusiasm for books I was eager to learn to read. Although our town was so small that it did not have a library, I was fortunate that there were always books in our house. I suppose it was only natural since mother had grown up in a family that loved books. Her great-grandfather was said to have had over 4,000 volumes in his personal library. We had far fewer books, but there were always plenty to choose from. I was encouraged to read not only for my subjects in school but also for entertainment, information, inspiration, or just for the sheer pleasure of reading.

  

 It was evident that Mother’s students loved her, but I had given it little thought until I ended up in her class in the ninth grade. We had diagrammed sentences and slogged through rules of grammar during the first few weeks before starting literature. The first time we hit a difficult passage of poetry she said “Close your books and just listen.” Until then I suppose it had never occurred to me that Mother read aloud to her students as well. When she recited the selection in her beautifully expressive voice, my classmates were as enchanted as I had been as a child. Whether Mother read Shakespeare’s plays or other works, the words jumped off the page and came to life. We might not have been able to explain every line, but when she read to us we understood the soul of the work.

 When Mother died, former students gathered at the graveside to recite “Crossing the Bar” for her one last time. Afterwards many of their remarks to me began with “When she read to us…” They, like I, owe her our gratitude. Because she loved books many of us developed a love of reading that will last a lifetime. I'm thankful that my mother loved to read, and shared her passion with her students and her children.