13 Ways of Looking at a Road Trip: 9, Waking

My grandparents shape my writing, are always present if not by name. I'm always writing about them, the way their stories have formed my own relationships, the way I could still watch hours of Lawrence Welk if I knew when it was on.

But to write for them, that's another story. Here's what I wrote over a year ago when I tried to compose something for my grandma Lentz.

I have to start at the beginning. Her hair. White yellow perm. Slack earlobes never pierced but never bare. Clips, elaborate. Her feet, in slippers, in slip-ons. Her pants, cotton. She moves slowly now, with help. Push number 2. That's where she was. Push number 2 and feel the elevator take its lift, after a dip, a rise, and brief fall. 2, and turn right. 2, and she's there, on her feet, in a skirt, selling children's clothes. I want to hear her speak, hear her laugh, hold her hand.

Where do I start? The Sound of Music. I see Grandma when I see or hear Julie Andrews. I see Grandma longing to sing, be free. I see the bubbled out walls, the falling ceilings, the Aussie banners, the koala clock. She kept Queensland with her, though I don't know where it all came from. She surely didn't bring it in her one trunk. Her family came, sent, brought. They sent her Vegemite, calendars of ocean. She couldn't even see wheat from her window.

All I get are fragments, memories that I can't form into any tribute. I hug her, and she makes the sound of love. I hold her elbow as she eases down steps, every movement a waterfall. I see her shake as she tells us she watched the sycamore in her yard split in two and crash into her window in the dark, like the earth falling in.

On a twin bed, she sleeps under a quilt my grandpa had picked out, floral squares with a pink border. I used it for a while in grad school, the weight just right for the heat of summer, but took it back home when I found something more my style. Its edges skirt the floor in full coverage; my grandma is blanketed in memory, though sometimes, now, she forgets what she has told you.

One morning in Hutchinson on the trip, after only two hours of sleep and the physical sickness that comes with its lack, I asked my grandma if I could take a nap on her bed while she showered, while my mother ran errands. I curled up on the quilt, on her pillow, and tried to shut my eyes to the tv in the other room, to the plant with four leaves that I gave her several years ago, to the clock beside the door ticking toward noon. I tried to sleep and kept thinking of the return of things: of her to a single bed, of me to my home, of treetops to ground. I remembered mornings at her house as a child, after sleeping over, and climbing into the warmth of my grandparents' bed, Grandpa already up tending to cats and applying Ben-Gay. Grandma and I, we would push down the floral bedspread and raise our legs against the pink walls to do the bicycle. Pump, she would say, to get our hearts going. Our legs ran circles in the air, peddling nowhere and everywhere, so we would be ready to walk. Her nightgown bared her lower legs, English white like mine, and we giggled, together riding into another day.

Grandma Lentz and I, from several years ago.

***

My memories of my grandma Jackson (or, Grandma Over-the-Bridge, as I knew her when I was young), are less physical but intimately tied to care: the way she hemmed up my pants, always 4" too long; the way everything was always in its place at their house, so you could depend on the constant of family; the way she slips coupons and dollars into my pocket; and the food--the food!

I remember her always sitting last, at the kitchen end of the table, spooning sides onto her plate after everyone was half into theirs. She never complained, just kept watch over everyone else's satisfaction. I sat near her, always, and the men farther down. I sat near her because I didn't know her as well as my grandma Lentz and because I wanted to, because I could see her strength and love for everyone that would come through in those small moments.

Sometimes she and my grandpa would take my brother and I home with them after church on Sundays, where she'd fix lunch and we'd play pool or computer games that we didn't have at home. I only remember sleeping over once or twice, and the shadow of the spider on the wall next to the bed that led me to spend the rest of the night on the couch leering at dark corners. But it was a good memory, after all. All good. And her specialty, which I even knew at the time was special, was her grilled cheese sandwich. She buttered the bread so evenly, sliced from the block of Velveeta so cleanly, browned each side so perfectly. I have tried and tried to make grilled cheese sandwiches as good as hers over the years (which is especially special because I generally can't eat cheese like that) but have failed.

I must not have told her, though, how much care I felt in her grilled cheeses because, later in the day of no sleep and attempted nap, when I returned to my grandparents' house where I was staying for the first time in many, many years, when she asked if she could make me something to eat and suggested a grilled cheese sandwich, I said, "Would you really?"

She looked surprised. Why would my face light up from amid the nausea and exhaustion, when just a few minutes ago nothing sounded good, at the thought of a mere sandwich?

"Your grilled cheese sandwiches are the best I've ever had," I told her. "I would definitely eat one right now and love it."

So she did. She made another perfect grilled cheese sandwich. Even fixed tomato soup on the side. And I felt better.

Each morning of my stay, she set out a plate, napkin, knife, fork, spoon, juice glass, and coffee cup for me. She sliced fresh zucchini bread and opened the English muffins, butter, and three kinds of preserves. I gave her a hug each morning when I left, something I wish I could have done more when I was young. It was always goodbye then, until the next time when my parents would take me "over the bridge" to their house in South Hutchinson. This time, it was goodbye until later in the day, until the next morning and the next hug. She's smaller than me now, and I wish I could bring her fresh-baked breakfasts so she could rest. Wheat-free breakfasts, because I know she's allergic. I wish I could give her the opportunity to sit first, to save her troubled back, to not worry about her young ones out in the world.

I slept in her former bedroom while I was there, and she in my great grandma's former room down the hall. The first morning, she quietly made the bed while I was in the shower. The last morning, after I had been away for two nights, I found she had washed the clothes from the first half of my trip, and they were stacked neatly on the bed. Every night I turned on the fan for extra white noise and wished Scooter to stay quiet until daylight so she could sleep, so I would make as little impact as possible, so she could stay in bed until after we woke and walk into the kitchen fresh from dreams.

Grandma and Grandpa Jackson and I, from several years ago.