Crossings
I. To a Life Unknown I can see my grandmother, on the ship from England, her books and purse upon her lap, tightly, traversing the great expanse, on the way to a life unknown. At 30, a spinster, to find a mate, she leaves a lush life of birding and golf, a botanist father for whom orchids are named and a mother, disappointed by a daughter who prefers hiking, walking stick in hand,
to serving suitors tea. II. Thousands of Miles Apart
Crossing the waves of chance and change, I picture my grandfather, on a boat,
from Ireland; from famine,
from fear and unrest; a minister's son, an Orangeman's boy, a potato farmer. He plows his way, through sea and soil, to the interior of Canada,
and he takes a room in the boarding house of my grandmother’s friend, where their proper paths cross briefly, barely; and they embark on their affair of letters and of words, an affair that persists over time and distance, my grandfather adrift on prairies of grain, my grandmother held in the tight lap of polite society, thousands of miles apart.
III. With Her Wedding Cake Upon Her Knees I trace the map of courteous correspondence, Its solemn slow crossing, to each, in turn, describing day to day happenings, ardor,
infatuations long passed, long unfelt. And since she is no longer young, and he is the only man to ask, she agrees, after years of posted passion, to marry him. I imagine my grandmother, her words still remembered, traveling by train, for days, sitting up, her wedding cake upon her broad lap, her thick knees unable to meet,
all the while moving resolutely forward, toward an unknown life with a man to whom she has barely spoken a living word; to a role she is ill prepared to fill, a grain inspector’s wife, a confidante of secrets she does not want, and refuses, to know.
IV. And Chikadees On Her Head I see her as I saw her when I was a child, before Parkinson’s, before disease took what freedom she had. I glimpse her, scarfed against the cold, wrapped in an old fur coat; which had crossed with her from England, with a hand-carved tip-top table, a scarred sea-chest with her trousseau; china and silver and the fine family name. She walks to get the mail, crossing the whitewashed lane bordered with snow and wagon-wheels. She has treats in her fur-lined pockets, sunflower seeds pursed in her lips, and chickadees alighting on her shoulders, and on her head.
V. The Life She Was Meant to Have
My grandmother tells me how grand her life will be after my grandfather dies, something he has alternately threatened and promised for years. She will live on Vancouver Island and have a garden again. She was there once, the garden attendant politely amazed by her knowledge of each Latin name, as he wheeled her large chair-ridden frame through the exhibits, one by one. She pictures herself, on the ferry once again, her bird books in her lap, spanning the sound, to the life she was meant to have. Grandmother’s final crossing cast off far too soon, and did not wait for her to live her island garden dream. I have her tip-top table, her beloved books of birds, and the painting of hydrangea, its looping Latin name, inscribed, along with mine, on the back. © Cynthia Neely
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