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Bud Grossmann’s
Words of the Week
for the Week of
September 27, 2015
Published as Family History
in a Gramma Letter
dated September 27, 1994
© 1994, 2015 by Bud Grossmann.
All Rights Reserved.
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Alaska Man With Gray in His Beard (2015)
© 2015 by Bud Grossmann
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SCENT OF A SEPTEMBER MORN
Tuesday, September 27, 1994
Dear Gramma,
When I first became a father, when David was only a few weeks old, I was carrying him in my arms as I came out of church after services one Sunday morning. A white-haired woman, in a hurry to get somewhere, scooted past us, but she turned to toss some advice as she went by. “Make the most of every moment, Bud,” she said, “because, before you know it, that child will be forty-two years old, just like my youngest one is now.”
I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard people remark with a sigh, “Oh, they grow up so fast,” but that was the only occasion on which someone specified a precise age that might arrive before I would be ready to face it.
The old woman’s remark came back again to me a few days ago when my brother Bruce turned forty-two. Bruce is in Alaska, I am in Hawaii, so I haven’t seen him in several years. I have some trouble picturing him as a forty-two-year-old man, perhaps with a little gray in his beard. I have an easier time bringing into my mind an image of Bruce at the age of one, in September of 1953, when I myself was four.
This is one of my earliest memories, and it’s as clear in my mind as if it happened last week. If you also recall the day, and if you’d like to correct me on the details, let me know. As I remember, though, on that morning of September 9 you and Grampa were sleeping in the south bedroom on the first floor of your farmhouse, just off the living room. I had slept on the sofa in the living room, and Bruce’s bed, beside the sofa, was his playpen, a square enclosure of varnished maple slats that eventually became scarred by the new teeth of more than a few of your various grandchildren.
I don’t know why Bruce and I were in your care at that time; maybe my mom or dad can tell me. In my memory of that day, sunlight was beginning to brighten the living room, but you and Grampa were still in bed. (That doesn’t seem right, does it? I’ve always known you to “get up with the chickens.” But anyway, that’s how I can see it today; I can make out the pattern of your wallpaper in the morning light.) Bruce was the first in the family to wake, and, with his cheerful babbling, he woke the rest of us. A powerful odor, from the baby’s diaper, also seems to have summoned you from your slumber. You called out from the bedroom to cheerfully deliver birthday greetings: “Well, good morning, Brucie! How is my one-year-old poop-a-doop?” Those exact words. They still make me smile.
Do you know how old you were on that September day, Gramma? A mere fifty-two years old! Imagine! Would you say the next forty-one years have flown by in a flash?
I hope you are making the most of each day in this year, 1994, welcoming the morning light and, now, the autumn colors with a prayer. I hope you routinely hike down the halls of The Home, where you now live, to seek out old friends and to discover new friends, as well. I hope you delight in each bite of no-sugar banana bread that my dad bakes for you. I encourage you to ask some of your visitors to jot notes for you on the stationery I’ve sent. Why don’t you send a few words today, Gram, to your friend Dorothea? Tomorrow maybe mail a note to your granddaughter Christie.
And, of course, dear Grandmother, please remember each week to ask your “secretaries” to help you mail a few of your thoughts to me.
I miss you; I always love to hear from you.
Love,
Buddy
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This page was updated Sat, Sep 26, 2015, 11:40PM CDT
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© 2015 by Bud Grossmann
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