A segment on last Sunday’s CBS Sunday morning lead me down this bittersweet path.
It seems that a creative, and maybe prophetic, person has attached a non-working rotary phone to a tree somewhere in the great northwest and it has astoundingly become a vehicle for healing and consolation. Large numbers of people, both individuals and families, have traveled to this tree in order to use this phone to connect with those loved ones who have passed on. They know that this is a non-working phone, nevertheless, it provides a way for them to reconnect in some way, each finding solace and comfort in calls to heaven.
It called to mind a memory of my Dad singing a song with lyrics that asked for a telephone call to heaven, wishing to connect to his mother who had died before I was born.
I had a fantastic grandmother, my Mom’s mother who meant as much to me as anyone I have ever known. She was the embodiment of love and fun and compassion and caring. If I have exhibited any good in my life, I can trace much of it back to her example.
All I have of Mary Smithwick, my father’s mother, is her picture and a few scarce anecdotes about who she was and how she lived. She sang me no lullabies, played no games with me, walked no dusty back roads to pick flowers. I often wonder about how it would have been to have known her.
I have four grandchildren. Tommy and Will are 12 and 10. I held Tom and Will on the days they were born. I’ve been there when needed for child care and had many sleepovers with them at our home … overnights at grandma and grandpas. We’ve experienced surprise visits to the movie tavern to see a Star Wars movie, hours and hours in the park on the swings and slides, baking together, had so many ways to connect. I don’t see them as often as I would like, but we know each other.
If I leave no other legacy, my love for them is something I want them to remember.
I have two spanking-new twin grandsons who live in Rochester. Ethan and Tyler were born in September, six weeks early during a pandemic. “Grandparenting” has been through pictures on the internet and one precious but too-quick Sunday afternoon. Their grandfather and I are in our 80s, and, reality being such as it is, there may not be enough time to stitch together the experiences that create the memories of grandparents as we would like.
Am I greedy to give what my grandmother gave me? I have the example of my paternal grandmother, an absence, an unfulfilled space that creates wonder. How would I be if I had known her, had memories on which to call when needed?
I am most assuredly not alone in this murk of yearning. This modern world, even though its electrical connectedness helps us catch up with distant family members, has also diminished that relationship that has meant so much to so many. No cell phone, Facetime, Messenger call or other digital phenomenon can duplicate a child asleep on your arms, a grandchild at your side in the kitchen, a hike in the woods, cheering on your grandchildren at school events. The digital world cannot recall the hugs and kisses from your grandparents, the forbidden sweets and staying up late, the soft feeling of sitting in their laps or holding their hands, listening to them read to you and sing lullabies until you fall sleep.
It’s time, fleeting, time that creates that bond.
My prayer is that we will be given that time to create memories with our youngest little guys so that, if needed, they and their older cousins might find it pleasing to make a phone call on a non-working phone in the woods to talk to their grandma and grandpa.
Hoping to leave a legacy of love
A segment on last Sunday’s CBS Sunday morning lead me down this bittersweet path.
It seems that a creative, and maybe prophetic, person has attached a non-working rotary phone to a tree somewhere in the great northwest and it has astoundingly become a vehicle for healing and consolation. Large numbers of people, both individuals and families, have traveled to this tree in order to use this phone to connect with those loved ones who have passed on. They know that this is a non-working phone, nevertheless, it provides a way for them to reconnect in some way, each finding solace and comfort in calls to heaven.
It called to mind a memory of my Dad singing a song with lyrics that asked for a telephone call to heaven, wishing to connect to his mother who had died before I was born.
I had a fantastic grandmother, my Mom’s mother who meant as much to me as anyone I have ever known. She was the embodiment of love and fun and compassion and caring. If I have exhibited any good in my life, I can trace much of it back to her example.
All I have of Mary Smithwick, my father’s mother, is her picture and a few scarce anecdotes about who she was and how she lived. She sang me no lullabies, played no games with me, walked no dusty back roads to pick flowers. I often wonder about how it would have been to have known her.
I have four grandchildren. Tommy and Will are 12 and 10. I held Tom and Will on the days they were born. I’ve been there when needed for child care and had many sleepovers with them at our home … overnights at grandma and grandpas. We’ve experienced surprise visits to the movie tavern to see a Star Wars movie, hours and hours in the park on the swings and slides, baking together, had so many ways to connect. I don’t see them as often as I would like, but we know each other.
If I leave no other legacy, my love for them is something I want them to remember.
I have two spanking-new twin grandsons who live in Rochester. Ethan and Tyler were born in September, six weeks early during a pandemic. “Grandparenting” has been through pictures on the internet and one precious but too-quick Sunday afternoon. Their grandfather and I are in our 80s, and, reality being such as it is, there may not be enough time to stitch together the experiences that create the memories of grandparents as we would like.
Am I greedy to give what my grandmother gave me? I have the example of my paternal grandmother, an absence, an unfulfilled space that creates wonder. How would I be if I had known her, had memories on which to call when needed?
I am most assuredly not alone in this murk of yearning. This modern world, even though its electrical connectedness helps us catch up with distant family members, has also diminished that relationship that has meant so much to so many. No cell phone, Facetime, Messenger call or other digital phenomenon can duplicate a child asleep on your arms, a grandchild at your side in the kitchen, a hike in the woods, cheering on your grandchildren at school events. The digital world cannot recall the hugs and kisses from your grandparents, the forbidden sweets and staying up late, the soft feeling of sitting in their laps or holding their hands, listening to them read to you and sing lullabies until you fall sleep.
It’s time, fleeting, time that creates that bond.
My prayer is that we will be given that time to create memories with our youngest little guys so that, if needed, they and their older cousins might find it pleasing to make a phone call on a non-working phone in the woods to talk to their grandma and grandpa.
