Grandma
Grandma
I have so many memories with my grandma. My mother's parents died when she was very young, so I never met them. And my dad's father died back in the 1930s and I never met him as well. So, grandma was my only grandparent.
I know my grandma took care of me from an early age. I think she lived with my dad and I for a couple years when I was around three or four. That is when my mom was sick with Tuberculosis and in a sanitarium. The only vivid memory is the time I got lost in a park near our house. That seems to be my earliest living recollection of anything.
From the time I was around five until I was probably around twelve, I spent a lot of time with my grandma. I can still envision the small court she lived in. I even remember the street, Chevy Chase Drive in Glendale. She was the back unit in the court and, on the backside of her apartment, away from the front door she had a garden. She could grow anything. She had all kinds of vegetables we would plant, take care, and pick. I especially loved the peas. She also had a kumquat tree and I loved to pick and eat the fruit. Inside the house were many house plants, violets as I recall. It seemed like a very old apartment, it probably dated back to the 1920’s and was white stucco.
It was a small apartment. You came into the living room and turned right to go into the dinette and kitchen area. To the left was a hall with a bathroom and two bedrooms. My grandma seemed very old but still very strong. She always wore a full-length dress. I never saw her in pants, even in the garden. She wore glasses but no hearing aids. And thinking back on it now, I believe she had false teeth, at least a bridge she kept in some solution in a cup, as I look back on it. Figuring it out now, she was over 70 when I was around eight and spending a lot of time with her. My perspective of old has surely changed with time.
My grandma never drove a car. Whenever we had to go anywhere, we would walk or take the streetcar. I can remember several streetcar trips with grandma before they took out the streetcar lines in the late 1950s. I do not remember precisely where we were going but I do remember going with her on the line between Burbank and Glendale. Given grandma did not drive, most of the time with grandma was not in going places, but rather being with her in the house and yard. Grandma did not own a TV as I can recall. She did have an old radio that was often on. So most of the time was spent playing games, putting together puzzles, reading stories, looking at old coins and pictures, and working in the garden
My grandma was very religious, a Southern Baptist. I did not know at the time, but learned much later, about how she refused to work in my mom and dad’s coffee house during the depression as beer was sold. As the beer sales were such an important part of the income, a compromise was reached where grandma only worked the early shift, before the beer sales. On Sunday morning my grandma always listened to the church service and sermon from “Church of the Open Door” in downtown Los Angeles. I never was forced to listen; I just recall it was something she always did on Sunday’s. I normally did something else while she listened as it seemed so boring to me. Grandma had a book of Children’s Bible Stories. We read from the book every time I was there. I always loved that look. I particularly liked the story of Noah’s Ark and of Moses. Looking back on it now, it seemed to be a book of just Old Testament stories as I do not remember any stories about Jesus. I wonder if that was a compromise to my mom? Guess I’ll never know.
My grandma had a parakeet named Skippy. Skippy said several words and phrases. The one I remember most is “pretty boy”. Skippy would say that over and over while looking in his mirror. I remember that Skippy became very sick. Grandma put Vicks Vapor Rub on the bottom of Skippy’s feet, covered him, turned up the heat, and the bird was miraculously cured. The game of choice was Bingo. We must have played it so much that once Skippy repeated the square “B-7”. The other games I remember playing were dominos and parcheesi.
By the time I was a teenager, visiting grandma came to an end. Guess I had too much to do and friends to be with, and I no longer needed a babysitter. Being with grandma was not looked upon favorably among my peers. I would see grandma at family gatherings and when dad would pick her up and bring her to our house for dinner. But looking back on it now, that time with grandma was so very special and meant so very much to me as a young child. She was such a positive person in my life.
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