Lyra wrote "in rebuttal" to my Skipper stories the other night. It makes me think of perception, especially the differences in how children remember things from how their parents do. And I'm sure my memories of my childhood are totally different from those of my siblings, even though we were in the same situations at the same time.
In the case of my siblings, however, I was the older one; Tigger is 6 years younger than I, and Baby Sis is 13 years younger. So of course our view of those years are different. Baby Sis remembers mostly just stories about our mother. Mom died before Baby Sis's third birthday. She did tell me once that she thought she remembered someone rocking her, but she doesn't know who that was.
And Tigger's memories are distorted (my point of view, of course), because the end of Mom's life was painful for all of us. I think he has blocked out those last few weeks for survival's sake. I will be seeing him next weekend at his wedding. If there is an appropriate time, I will ask him what he remembers of the years when Mom was alive.
He was her very favorite; her beloved son. He made her laugh, ruefully, sometimes, but always with love and delight. She was a tiger in her protection of him; from his father, and from his older sister. Nothing he did was wrong (my point of view, remember!). My father told me, the year before he died, that the fiercest arguments he ever had with Mom were about how she "spoiled" Tigger. I have to wonder how good HIS memory was those many years later!
Nevertheless, Tigger was her joy. So when, in her illness, she turned on him the night before she was hospitalized the last time, and was verbally and physically abusive to him, he was traumatized. He began stuttering then, a disability that has plagued him all his life. We talked one night, via phone, which is hard for him to do, about Mom's death. He had some very peculiar ideas about her illness and her death. And Dad was of the generation that felt that if you didn't talk about it, it didn't happen; so he would never answer Tigger's questions about that last horrifying night. I tried to straighten Tigger out, but his imagination, which he had been feeding for 35 plus years, was stronger than my version of that night. We've never talked about it again.
But, back to children and parents: versions of the same incident differ even as they are happening. Memories become more egocentric. Maybe sometime Lyra will write about the old man who was hitchhiking, and how she looked at that incident. I've already written about Crissy, the cat.In Which an Old Poem Comes to Light That little essay prompted an E-Mail from Lyra that said she had forgotten about it, so I could let that guilt trip go. Love that girl!
6:50 p.m.
All of which prods me into recording what I remember. I want to record my "story". I am so sorry that neither of my grandmothers did that. Grandma N. was born in 1880 and lived for 98 years. Just think of what she saw during her lifetime! But, more importantly, what was her daily life like? What did she think about as a young woman, wife, mother? As she aged, and her children grew into parents, then grandparents, what did she think about them, about life, about the changes in the world around her? The answers to these questions may have helped all her descendants to grapple with their struggles. Maybe not; but we'll never know.
And my mother's mother, my Finnish grandmother; what a story she could have told! Even if we didn't have access to her deep dark secrets, we would know a bit about the "little Finland" that existed in that Massachusetts town around the turn of the century into the 70's. It was a good-sized colony, with its own newspapers, bakeries, community centers, and most of the children entered into public school with nametags, because they didn't speak English!
Maybe no one will care about what I thought, but if they do, they will have the remembrances in my journals to find their answers...from my perception.
9:41 AM
10 below zero last night. DB has been working on the recalitrant garage door so that I can get my car out. Of course, once I do, I will have to drive around this weekend without a current inspection sticker! Hopefully, I can get it done on Monday.
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