seanmháthair
A bit of trivia: The yard in front of the place where I lived from the age of 5 to 18 was abundant in four leaf clovers. I used to pick them and press them into books. How ironic that we never had any good luck there, isn't it?
When I was a little girl most St. Patrick's Days were spent with my dad's mother. I remember this because she would make a huge deal out of it because she was, at least partially, of Irish heritage. Of course, being Catholic she was big on trying to pass on to me all the stories of the saints, of which I remember basically none. Wouldn't she shit now if she knew that my opinion of the matter, based on the very little bit that I have learned, is that the Christians should have just left the Pagans the fuck alone. Though I will give St. Patrick some extra credit for the Celtic cross because it is quite beautiful.
Anyway, every year she would call in to our local radio station and dedicate Danny Boy to me. Soon you would hear the announcer on the air saying my name and dedicating the song to me from my grandmother. Then she would dance me around the room and sing along with it and that is one of very few fond memories I have of childhood.
We had a major falling out over various things including my relationship (or lack of) with my wretched father. She felt I should love him and see him regardless of what he did to us over my lifetime and that I was a bad daughter. She showed me pictures one Christmas of "Cliff's kids" all five by this particular lady in the picture. She stressed the words Cliff's kids as if she did not consider my brother or me to be his children anymore. This is particularly hard to take from a grandmother. All of the children in the pictures were conceived and born during his marriage to my mother and between the times of him being gone for months at a time and him returning to claim us as his family so he could beat my mother and destroy our house and terrorize us and then leave again to go make more babies with more women. For example, once or twice he had brought this particular woman out to our house while he beat my mother to a pulp. Once he even left her stranded there with us and she helped pick my mother's bloody body off the floor and pack ice on her. This was after a particularly bloody beating in the head with an old heavy rotary dial phone that used to hang on our wall. I found the whole experience of his mistress and her little baby being there with us especially hurtful and insulting as my dad still thought of my mom and us as his property yet he brought them there to our house to witness what he did to us. Sorry, grandma, if I don't find that particularly paternal or feel that I owe him anything more than to maybe spit in his face.
That combined with her lies about me when I was a teenager that began circulating in family and then on to my mother including some nonsense involving cults and sacrifices and being a whore. This all came during the time I had gotten pregnant and unfortunately miscarried our first baby which my mother was fully aware of as I told her straight away I was pregnant and suffered her wrath severely from that point until the day I left home. During those years I wore a lot of black and listened to lots of "dark" music including, but certainly not limited to, The Cure, the Misfits and Danzig so of course in a small town like mine that meant that I sacrificed babies to Satan, right? Stories began to trickle back to my mother of sightings by my aunts and grandmother of me sitting on old men's laps all over town. I have no idea where the fuck all that came from and found that part sort of amusing.
So as you can imagine, I didn't have anything more to do with that side of the family from that point forward. I have only spoken to my grandmother once since I was fifteen. I took Logan to her house to trick-or-treat once when he was about two. I guess I wanted her to see what she was missing out on. It was uncomfortable and sad. So I never went back. I figured that part of my life was dead as so many other parts were and are now. I miss her though, or the idea of her. The person I thought I knew when I was very little. My step-grandfather died a few years ago. I wasn't told until two weeks after his funeral. That is a whole other sad story.
When we go to Ohio I drive past her house to look for a light on. It is comforting in some little way. I look up at the windows and remember what each room looked like inside and all of the things that were there when I was little. I think about being snowed in during the blizzard with her and making homemade Christmas ornaments. I think about the dollhouses she made and how much love and time she put into every little detail from start to finish and I think about all of the military stuff that was always tucked into closets and corners because my step-grandfather was a retired Army Colonel. I think about the crucifix that hung over the bed in the baby blue room that used to intimidate me into saying my prayers each night before I went to sleep, prayers that were never answered until I drove out of that town and left all of that life behind. Each time I think of the day when we will drive past and someone else will be living there. That is probably the only way I will know she is gone. Anyway...here's to you grandma.
Oh Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling
From glen to glen, and down the mountain side
The summer’s gone, and all the flowers are dying
‘Tis you, ‘tis you must go and I must bide
But come ye back when summer’s in the meadow
Or when the valley’s hushed and white with snow
‘Tis I’ll be here in sunshine or in shadow
Oh Danny boy, oh Danny boy, I love you so
And if you come, when all the flowers are dying
And I am dead, as dead I well may be
You’ll come and find the place where I am lying
And kneel and say an “Ave” there for me
And I shall hear, tho’ soft you tread above me
And all my dreams will warm and sweeter be
If you’ll not fail to tell me that you love me
I’ll simply sleep in peace until you come to me
I’ll simply sleep in peace until you come to me
Posted by gwendolyn on March 17, 2005 at 11:40 AM