Or riding. My Grandma Rosa was doing the driving, and my cousin Ralph and I were her passengers. Just a while earlier we had hopped into her 1950's gray-blue sedan, following her mysterious "Get in the car, we're going for a ride" order.
Ralph lived with Grandma, and at about ten years old he understood her better than anyone--both in the Spanish-only language she spoke and in the somewhat "trying" personality she was known for.
Depending on the source, Grandma could be cold and insensitive, unreasonable and unyielding, even insulting and mean. Somehow "warm and fuzzy" adjectives never quite made it as words of description for Grandma, but about this I have to say I sometimes puzzled.
Each time I stayed a night with Grandma, I was ready to soon stay another. I can't say she elicited every opposite of the adjectives she was always accused of, but the vibes between us were pretty darn good. She watched out for me, made sure I knew where the extra blankets were and always welcomed me warmly to the food in her cupboards.
She sometimes even ran a bubble bath for me in her big old-fashioned bathtub, and a really special image between just the two of us is of the time she parked in front of an ice cream parlor and coaxed me across its threshold.
You wouldn't think I would need to be lured into the place, but if I spoke all-English and Grandma spoke all-Spanish--and she didn't usually indulge in Americana like this--I guess I needed a little convincing that Grandma knew what she was doing.
Her smile told me she knew exactly what she was doing. We settled at a table and were presented with a menu, and Grandma motioned to me that I should order for the both of us. I was about seven years old at the time, and I gotta say the word "parfait" was new to me, too. But the menu photos gave me the gist of things and so I shyly ordered one for each of us.
It literally couldn't have gone sweeter, or better. Grandma was like the proverbial child in a candy (or ice cream) shoppe over that parfait. We savored every creamy layer of our treat and saved the cherry for last, and even in my little girl-ness it wasn't at all hard to imagine the little girl my grandma used to be.
My grandma had her pensive moments, and on the day of our Sunday drive I caught that vibe also. I didn't suspect we were driving to an ice cream parlor at all, and soon enough saw this was a much more serious mission. Peering out the back seat window of the cavernous sedan, I saw that we were threading our way through a hilly neighborhood of newer homes, but that Grandma wasn't intrigued with the houses at all. Instead she pulled over at the rise of an as-yet open field, not filled with housing but taken up in use as a cemetery, one overgrown and neglected.
Stopping the car, Grandma said a few words to Ralph. The two exited and I followed, no questions asked. The three of us walked up the hill, with my grandma beginning an evident search through high weeds and straw-like grass, and dozens of grave-sites abandoned and weathering. Ralph stayed close to her, and I in my puzzlement looked about and wandered nearby, wondering what the search was about.
After a few moments Ralph approached me and said quietly, "She said she had another boy and that he died when he was a baby. He was buried here." (My dad was her only son, as far as we had known) "She thinks they're going to use this spot for more houses, and she wants to see his grave again."
With a little understanding now, I searched also, but even Grandma wasn't sure what to look for. She had become a widow when my dad was just five years old, and this child had evidently had a pauper's burial. There were few stones in this cemetery, and all the wooden crosses and markings had deteriorated beyond recognition.
I don't know what my grandmother hoped for from that visit, but I remember the excursion almost as if it were yesterday. Did she think she could do anything to preserve the memory and the remains of this lost child? It seems bizarre to me now that she did not, as she seemed willing to do for other matters, seek the help of her grown daughters and son.
So there we were, this odd trio, and when we wrapped up the search Grandma hadn't found anything she was certain of. What did seem certain was that she had completed her mission and that whatever happened now was best left alone. I imagine her thoughts might have been along the lines of other pioneers who went to foreign lands and felt they had to leave some things up to the graces of God.
These remembrances were brought to mind recently when, for a sister's birthday, I posted a favorite story from our childhood on social media. Most of our siblings were not a direct part of my particular story, but they loved it because it gave new history and insight to our family dynamics. Their reactions to that and others family stories in this blog made me realize: we all have stories that were unique to our own experience. My cousin Ralph is gone now, but I feel certain he would remember our visit to the graveyard, and would even have more to say....how many more true stories and perspectives are there out there, untold and destined to a graveyard of their own? Stories untold are like stories unlived--if you have them, tell them!! With discretion, of course!
Note: I've told several stories about my dad's mother and his side of the family in this blog, and I realize also there are untold stories about my Grandma Ramona. Grandma ROSA was for some reason the "squeaky wheel that always got the grease" but Grandma RAMONA was amazing too, in her own way and for reasons related to her own unique life experience. She deserves a turn, next!
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