Farewell To Grandmother

AFTER THE PASSING of grandfather, I finished the year at Princeton and then returned to spend the summer in the home with grandmother. As might be expected, she was pensive at times. I knew that she was terribly lonely but I did not know it from anything she said; it was more from the things she did; she wandered about the house at times as if in a maze.

On occasions she would ask me to walk with her in the orchard as the sun was sinking low; grandmother always loved to see the sun as it sank behind West Hill; she spoke of the changing colors of the clouds from pearl to pink, to roseate hue and then, to fiery red.

"That's a grand panorama, Paul. Could anything be more majestic? It's the work of a kindly and omnipotent hand. Sunsets always give me a feeling of comfort, repose and confidence. Nothing ill can come from the hand of one who loves beauty so and brings it to his children."

She seldom spoke of grandfather though I knew that over and above all of her words was the ever-present consciousness of him. On one occasion she did speak of him as we were walking down the path in the orchard together. As near as I can remember, her words were:

"I feel that I have been fortunate, Paul, far beyond my due in having had the unwavering love of your grandfather for more than sixty years. No woman can be blessed by anything to compare with the love of a good husband, the father of her children. Our lives haven't been easy; in fact, it has been a constant struggle from beginning to end and we have had our full share of sorrow. We lost three children and they were all very dear to us. We used to wonder at times whether anything in life was worth while but there were still duties and tasks to do; there were the living as well as the dead. There can never be anyone so near to a woman as her husband. My thoughts have been Pa's thoughts and his have been mine. It seems to me that part of me is living and part of me is dead."

"Paul, I wonder at times if you realize how much you meant to Pa. At times, it used to seem to him that his life had been a failure. As you know, he had high hopes for your father. He spent money freely for his education and his disappointment almost broke his heart. And then you came to us quite providentially and Pa fastened all his hopes on you. Paul, you must not fail him. Work hard and live honorably for your grandfather's sake."

After another lingering look at the fast fading color in the west, grandmother turned and I followed her down the hallowed pathway to our house.

This is not primarily a story of grandfather and grandmother except as it serves to illustrate the character of the folks who lived in New England during the days of my boyhood, and, to a considerable extent, the character of the folks who live there still. It is not primarily an autobiography, though the facts revealed were seen through my eyes. The eyes of most of the companions of my boyhood have long been closed in death.

Instead of returning to Princeton in the autumn, I began a year's employment in the office of the Sheldon Marble Company in West Rutland. All I had to do was to get up at 5:00 AM., breakfast, walk a mile to the office, attend to all the stoves, sweep and dust in readiness for the arrival of the officials and office men, and then do my day's work with the others-and find things to do when not told. Before the year closed I graduated from office boy to more important positions. It was a valuable experience. After that it was grandmother's decision that her grandson should go west to study law.

During my last days in the valley, I had a feeling that I was standing on the threshold of life and that the future was all uncertainty. Would I be able to cope with the destitution and privation which I must inevitably encounter or would I be driven back, bruised and beaten as my father had been?

There was this difference between my father's case and mine; there was still a home in which my father could find shelter; in my case, there soon would be none. The old home, sacred to the memory of grandfather and grandmother, was before long to be closed never to be opened again as a home for our family. Grandmother was to spend the remaining days of her life in the comfortable home of her daughter, Aunt Mellie Fox, Uncle George and their family.

My father was dependent on the trust created by grandfather and such further assistance as might be given him by grandmother. Quite clearly the time was not far distant when I would be on my own.

Perhaps the saving clause in my grandfather's will was that which left me to my own resources, except for some little help from grandmother. I did not regret it; my life was to be an adventure; what more could a live, energetic boy have asked. I have always felt considerable pride in the fact that grandfather felt I would be able to take care of myself. My inheritance was far more enduring than money could have been; the munificence of my hard-working, self-sacrificing grandparents gave me the advantage of a formal education in preparatory schools, college and the university but far more important they gave me the advantage of their example in their well-ordered home where love abode.

I think I inherited something of grandfather's broad spirit of tolerance. Grandfather was an ambassador of good-will in the eyes of the youngster who sat at his table during his impressionable years; he never spoke evil of any man nor of any man's religion or politics.

My year of work passed quickly and the day so long anticipated came at last. Grandmother and I were entirely alone except for the presence of an elderly woman who had taken most of the housekeeping cares from the worn and weary shoulders of grandmother. For one reason and another, it had been planned that grandmother and I were to spend these last few hours together, possibly because Aunt Mellie and Uncle George knew that grandmother would prefer it that way. They were to drive to Wallingford later in the day, lock up the house and take grandmother with them to return no more.

It was early in the month of September and the morning was bright and cheerful although our hearts were heavy-laden. The parting hours were spent in the dining room; grandmother and I sat on the horsehair sofa facing the table, where for years we all had eaten good wholesome food, and where, long before my time, father had eaten his meals.

The banjo clock hung on the north wall where it had been for at least three generations and we were within hearing of the sitting room clock not far away. In fact there had been no change in the dining room since the night of the feast of bread and milk and blueberries, served to father, Cecil and me years ago.

While the kitchen was the center of the house so far as activities were concerned, and the sitting room the place for rest, reading and reflection, it was the dining room where important discussions took place; the dining room was the scene of the alpha and omega of my New England home life.

When grandmother could control her emotion, she said:

"This seems not new to me, Paul; I have lived it over and over again. I have even thought of what my last words should be but they have all gone from me now. I must not, however, talk about myself; it is of Pa and his high hopes for you that I must talk. You do know, Paul, how Pa's thoughts centered on you, don't you?"

I answered, "Yes, I am conscious of it and I hope that I shall not prove entirely unworthy of his trust but he has set a high mark to live up  to."

"It is indeed a high mark," she resumed, "but you are capable of living up to it; you must, Paul. I know how anxious you are to see the world. Pa and I talked that over and he was not opposed to it if you can accomplish it without neglecting your studies. Where there's a will, there's a way, Paul, and you will have to work it out.

It won't be easy but it can be done. The night you and Cecil and your father entered this house is still as fresh in my mind as if it were yesterday. Some folks said that we were making a great mistake in assuming the responsibility of raising you, Paul. We were getting along in years and had already raised a family. You may have heard some such talk, Paul," looking at me inquiringly.

I answered, "Indeed I have, Grandma, indeed I have and I thought that it was probably true."

"There's not a word of truth in it, Paul. Banish it from your mind; instead of shortening our lives, I think it has lengthened them. Folks who have raised families and seen their children go out into the world are generally pretty lonely. When the fountains of love dry up there isn't much to live for so your coming to us seems now to have been Providential; we had to have someone to lavish affection upon; there were worries enough, of course, but that is life. I have thought sometimes that it may have been an injustice to you to have been tied up here with two old folks; children need brothers and sisters to round out their lives; however you soon found companions of your own selection and that helped some.

With these words grandmother had told me all that had been pent up in her heart.

Glancing up at the banjo clock, I was alarmed to note that the hands pointed to eleven o'clock; I had fifteen minutes only to catch my train. When I arose to go, grandmother, for the first time in her life, so far as I knew, burst into a flood of tears. I threw my arms about her frail body and said, "Never mind, Grandma, I shall be back to see you soon." Her answer was a shake of her head; she spoke no words.

On my way past the home of Judge Button, I stopped to tell Ellen to please go in and comfort grandmother and that service she was more than glad to render.

Around the corner, down Depot street and alongside the white fence where the shadows of grandfather's lantern had danced in fantastic figures, down to the railway station, prim and tidy as it had always been, I made my way. There was the usual flurry of excitement as the eleven-fifteen train came in and went out. As I went with it my heart was tumultuously beating as familiar objects faded in the distance. I was alone and terribly lonely. Grandmother was the last guard; the key would soon be turned in the door.

I received frequent letters from grandmother, all of which have been carefully preserved. She kept me posted as to the events in her new home. For instance; Cousin Mattie was enjoying a trip to Europe in the company of good friends and the incidents of her travels were of great interest to grandmother; it was wonderful to have a granddaughter in Europe; grandmother had never thought of such a thing and Mattie would never be the same girl again after having had a trip to Europe. She wrote also of the kind thoughtfulness of other members of the family; everything was being done for her comfort.

One year and one month from the date of my departure from the old home, I, then a student in the law department of the University of Iowa, received a telegram from Uncle George stating that the spirit of grandmother had flown in the night. There had been nothing to indicate that the time was near; grandmother simply went to sleep and did not awake.

I did not return for the funeral but father, mother and other members of the family were present. According to the current issue of the Rutland Herald:

"A small funeral party drove down the Creek Road to Wallingford with the mortal remains of Pamela Harris, widow of the late Howard Harris of Wallingford and mother of Mrs. George Fox of this city. The attendance was limited to members of the family and near relatives. No more beautiful day could have been selected; the colors of the mountainsides had arrived at the point of perfection as the funeral party wound its way along the valley of Otter Creek to Green Hill cemetery in Wallingford where the remains were laid beside the body of the husband of the deceased.

The Herald extends sympathy to Mrs. George Fox and her family and such felicitations as may seem proper because of the fact that the closing chapter of the long and beautiful life of her mother was written on one of Vermont's most beautiful autumn days."

So grandmother was returned to the soil from which she sprang; it would have seemed a desecration to have laid the bodies of grandfather and grandmother anywhere else, All of her life and the best part of grandfather's life had been spent in the valley. Their children were born and brought up there and there three of their children had died. During the days of her childhood grandmother had tramped over the hills in and above Green Hill cemetery; she had picked buttercups, daisies and spring violets on Cemetery Hill and in its protecting soil the bodies of generations of loved ones had been laid.

The small family lot lies on the hillside not so far up as to be beyond hearing of the tinkle of water as it falls from the ever-flowing fountain in Cemetery Pond. In this lot, the bodies of Frances number one and Frances number two, as well as the bodies of the eldest daughter, Mary Reed and her husband, had been laid.

Grandmother seldom spoke of past bereavements; possibly I never would have known of Frances number one and Frances number two had it not been for their graves in the cemetery lot and two tiny leather shoes which I discovered in a drawer of the kitchen table; grandmother's thoughts were mostly centered on her every day duties.

On all sides of the Harris lot there were the lots of our neighbors, the Martindales, Buttons, Munsons, Childs, Batchellers, Scribners, Hills, Kents, Ballous, Ainsworths, Marshes, Millers, Townsends, Newtons, Coles, Staffords and scores of others whose names were well known in our valley. Yes, Green Hill cemetery had a rightful claim to the bodies of grandfather and grandmother; to have turned deaf ears to it would have seemed unjust. Our valley was grandmother's idea of Paradise.

Grandmother believed in the resurrection and, it always having been difficult for her to meet strangers, it would be a great blessing to be surrounded by home folks when the horn of Gabriel sounded. A most welcome sight to grandmother on the morning of resurrection day would be Judge Button with his little gray shawl thrown over his shoulders and his customary salutation, "Good morning, Mrs. Harris; this is going to be a fine day."

I have frequently tried to picture to my mind the events of that October day. The funeral procession moving slowly down the valley, along lazy, winding Otter Creek, lit up by the flaming colors of the hillsides and mountains. I have recalled the last view which our folks had of the mortal remains of grandmother almost as vividly as though I had been present. I could see grandmother's worn hands lying on her breast and the never-to-be-forgotten swollen bone of her lame wrist, her supreme badge of honor. Nothing which manicurists and beauticians have ever been able to accomplish with the hands of mothers and grandmothers has ever seemed comparable in beauty with the artistry of love and duty as wrought on grandmother's worn hands and lame wrist. Of the eighty-nine pounds which composed grandmother, every pound and every ounce was dedicated to loving service, the ingredient which makes home life sublime.

For more than fifty years the warm spring suns have brought back to life the grass and wild flowers in the little cemetery lot; summer suns have brought them to maturity and autumn winds have in due course directed to the graves of grandmother and grandfather myriads of maple leaves which also had spent their life courses and needed only a quiet place to lie down and rest. The icy blasts of more than a half-century of winters have sent snowflakes by the millions to form downy blankets to protect the graves of grandfather and grandmother.

More than sixty years the aged couple had carried their rugged cross together; so long, in fact, they could not have done without it; they did not loathe it, they loved it. A merciful Providence had arranged that grandmother was to be the one to bring up the rear guard; there were so many little things to be done and grandmother was the one to do them. Grandfather would have been helpless without her and I doubt whether he would have lived the year out. Scores of times during each day he would have reached his trembling hand out for her, forgetful of the fact that she had gone, and scores of times each day the wound would have been reopened. No, it was a blessing that big, strong grandfather went on ahead and that little frail grandmother remained to finish up the odds and ends that had to be attended to.

When Thoreau saw the woodsman's axe destroying the forest, he exclaimed:

"Thank God, they cannot cut down the clouds!

"There are some eternal things that the destructive powers of men, in all their fury, cannot destroy. To think on these things is to achieve an inward quiet and peace even in a war-torn world. The stars still shine. The sun still rises and sets. The mountains are not moved, Birds sing. Little streams dance merrily on their way. Flowers bloom and give off their perfume. The world goes right on being an everlastingly beautiful place.

"There are indestructible qualities of human spirit, too.

Mother love is immortal and though crushed to earth it will rise again. Courage and sacrifice glow with a new light in the midst of the black-outs of hope. Faith gallantly rides the whirlwind sweeping the earth.

"You cannot cut down the clouds! The spirit of man cannot be destroyed! The finest things of life are immortal . . . they will survive!"

-Friendly Adventurer