Talking to Mary

My favorite cousin Mary called me to wish me Happy Birthday last night, and we wound up talking for over two hours! It's a rare occasion for me to spend time on the phone. As I age, I dislike the facelessness of phone conversations, and I admit, I'd rather e-mail. It's equally faceless, but somehow I think better in writing than I do in conversation. Nevertheless, it was wonderful to talk to Mary. We discussed her mother, my dear Aunt Susie, who died a little over a year ago. Mary had dreamed about her mother recently, dreaming that she had not died, but had lived and was being rehabilitated. I told Mary that it wasn't uncommon to have a dream like that. In fact, I mentioned to her that the more time that passed since my parents' deaths, the more I dream about them being young again. It's as if I age, and they get young again, like they were when I was a little girl. That pleased Mary. I think she likes the idea that she'll have her mother in her memory the way she was when Mary was a girl.

I told Mary I was planning a portrait of Aunt Susie, and Mary said she had just the right photo for me to use as the basis. I was happy to hear it, since the only one I seem able to find is one of my aunt taken just a few years ago, when she was in her mid-to-late 80s.

Mary also told me that she and her two surviving brothers had agreed to tear down their mother's old home. That breaks my heart, but I have to admit, the old place is on the verge of falling apart. They've pretty much stripped out all the furniture and belongings, and the family members plan to keep some of the boards and other items to use as keepsakes. I asked Mary to keep something for me, maybe a door knob or hinge or something, that I could have as a keepsake. Aunt Susie would laugh at all of us for such sentimentality, but it would make me feel good to put my hand on a doorknob that she had touched so often that the finish was gone.

I just can't imagine driving down Miller Road to where Aunt Susie's house is, and for it to be gone. It's been there for decades, the oldest house on the road. What will the fence surround? Or will they take it down, too? I've been through that swinging gate more times than I can count, each time with happiness. If home is where the heart is, then that old house was much more my home than the structure in which I grew up. Aunt Susie's house was the center of my universe for all of my life. To imagine it being gone is just too hard, and unless there are odd circumstances to occur, I doubt I will ever drive down Miller Road again, not even to see my cousins whose houses are near their mother's house.

I wish there was a way I could buy it, but I know they wouldn't sell it. And what would I do with it? I've more or less resigned myself to living in Michigan until we retire and then to relocating as near our sons as possible. Certainly, in the seven years I've lived in Michigan, I haven't developed a sense of being "home." It can't be home if my family doesn't live there. S.