Mornings After

The morning after my father’s funeral, the women of the family gathered around the kitchen table for breakfast and ended up talking for hours. I wondered if my grandfather’s name would come up and, suddenly, it did. Just as suddenly, my sister and cousin clutched their arms over their chests and jerked away from the table as if to protect themselves from an impending threat. My sister said, “He scared me.” My cousin said, “I never liked him.”

I was 42 and I’d never told anyone, but I decided this was the time. When I was about 5, we visited my grandfather in the boarding house where he lived in his retirement. My sister and I spent the night in his bedroom. Mom and Dad were across the hall.

I remember it as being “my turn”. I can only assume that’s what he told me, but that morning after my father’s funeral at the kitchen table, my sister indignantly said it certainly never happened to her. My mother said it couldn’t be true because my grandfather always gave her such nice presents. My cousin said our grandfather had molested the housekeeper who raised her following her mother’s death. The only other comments were on the times my grandfather was found alone with elderly women in the nursing home where he spent his last days.

My own memory is selective. My grandfather’s bed is against the wall; my sister is sleeping across the room. The bedroom is dark – the hallway is dark- the wide steps down to the front door are dark. The images from the bathroom are vivid and, thankfully, filled with light - black and white checkerboard tiles, a pedestal sink, a claw foot tub. However, the knowledge of this night is present in every second of every interaction I have ever had with every other adult male until this minute in my life, sitting at this kitchen table at age 42.

The morning after, my family walked across the street to the diner where my grandfather ate breakfast each day. He sat at the counter with other men from the boarding house. The four of us found a table in the crowded restaurant and ate while sunlight flooded through the windows.

But, light can’t expose everything.

Big Floweredy Dresses

My sister and I made our first trip to California together, two undeniably Southern women in our fifties, expecting to be swaddled in the messages that we remembered as teens from the 1960’s.

My sister couldn’t wait to mingle with the hippies that she was certain would be evident on every block in Berkeley. She says she saw them – but I saw linen, khaki, shoes you wear to walk to work, people with the good sense to dress comfortably.
The two of us, however, were dressed in big floweredy dresses, the kind women our age wear all over the South. I’m talking flowers the size of dinner plates - bright reds, blues, yellows, and oranges, all splashed onto the same wearable canvas. Nothing in Berkeley was blooming as loudly as we were.

In the South, when you see women our age enter a room with bold colors and patterns, it sends a message. Not the same message as “tacky” which requires a sense of style cultivated over a lifetime and a “bless your heart” level of condescension. Just look at the jewelry my mother wears to go to the grocery store.

But, you can expect boldly dressed women to speak up freely and often. At home, at least one woman would have rushed over to me on the street to ask, “Where did you get that beautiful floweredy dress? I’ve been looking for something just like that to wear for jury duty next week.” A middle-aged Southern woman wearing a loud dress would never have a problem being the lone holdout on a hung jury.

The obvious statements I did find in Berkeley were on the T-shirts sold by the street vendors. For months after my return, my husband drove around Greenville, SC, with his souvenir shirt that read, “Born OK the first time.” Lord knows what that man will have to say when I get home after my next trip.