Peggy

For two weeks we have been clearing out Mama's house. Just that morning we had cleared the doorway enough to enter her craft room. Like an archeological dig with each layer we found evidence of dalliances with different art forms. This wooden thing marked the beginning of the wood carving strata. As we excavated there had been the oil painting strata: wooden boxes filled with rainbows of oil paint, fine brushes and vivid landscapes. Below that was the sewing era. That excavation had revealed an open, threaded sewing machine set up on a long table poised for the next project. There was the knitting era, the drawing era, pastels, toile painting, china painting, doll making, needlepoint, cross-stitch. We still had a ways to go until we hit bottom. Each layer exposed beautiful and artistic work, all abandoned without a backwards glance.###
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It is a fantastical and frightening task sorting through this house. Everywhere there is evidence of a creative and unusual mind inclined toward the fanciful and not the practical. Someone inclined to collect items that catch her eye and not inclined to ever throw anything away. “You don’t know what it was like living through the depression”, was a common wail. ###
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All mixed together are objects ranging from leather bound first editions and silver tea sets to corncob pipes and bags of 30 year old junk mail. Much we find is impersonal and odd; much is deeply intertwined with our personal histories. Everything tells something about our mother. But, there is much from each of our own lives; toys, report cards, school projects. More extensively there are letters and pictures exposing 100 years of the loves and hurts of my entire family. ###
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We found the 1955 obituary of our uncle found dead in his rented room at age 35. We have his two Silver Stars and the letter from a 2 star General describing the heroic acts that earned them. There is a long eloquent letter to his parents telling how this honor was really theirs. We found letters from our Grandfather to the VA entreating them to do more to help him, ' I sent you a healthy man, and you returned him broken'. And finally, letters from friends and family expressing sorrow and some relief that he was finally out of pain.###
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There was a 1907 newspaper article the morning after our great-aunt eloped. It served as the wedding announcement to her recalcitrant father. The bridal couple wanted a honeymoon and a fortnight before facing him. They left town while the morning paper detailed her escape and their deception. The groom explained that her father's objection was not to the groom, but to any man wishing to marry his daughter. They stated they would be back when his wrath had abated. There was a later newspaper article commemorating this same couple's 30th wedding anniversary.###
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In the attic we found boxes and boxes of Christmas decorations. As a child, I remember the house decorated like a little magical fairyland. Packed away with all these decorations were piles of condolence letters and cards from 1975, the Christmas my father died. She packed all the decorations and all the cards up and never decorated for Christmas again. In spite of that, throughout the house we found bags of Hallmark Christmas ornaments that she continued to buy through the years.###
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The most frightening thing we found in the house was the arsenal: guns, sabers, knives, hand grenades, bombs and ammunition. Most were souvenirs from all the wars of the 20th century. Once, behind a bookshelf we found what looked to be an intact bomb, WWII vintage. If she was going to blow us up, I wish she would have done it at the beginning of all this. We shrugged and put it upstairs in the arsenal closet, which also doubled as the temporary Robert E. Lee Memorial. ###
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The box of pictures from 40 to 60 years ago entertained us for a while. We laughed and pointed to items in the pictures. “I threw that away yesterday”, “That went to Goodwill”, “I took that home last trip”, “I saw that sitting in one of the piles in Grandma’s room”. These items from our past, from the lives of our family ranged from hats and dresses, to furniture, paintings and statues and they were all here in this house. We were slowly dismantling it all.###