Handkerchiefs
I learned something about my self this weekend.
I helped my aunt pack her things in preparation for a move. She just turned 77, and has only had two major moves in her life. In this process, she has given me little things that have been in the family for many years, because she has no room for them anymore.
Saturday, she gave me an old padded tin box, with pictures of pastures and sheep in varying shades of sepia. It sat on a bureau in their home for as long as she can remember. It was probably a biscuit box originally, but the family called it the handkerchief box. It is full of handkerchiefs; some from trips, some plain, some with fancy embroidered edges, some dreamy sheer florals.
As we looked into the box together, she came to some plain handkerchiefs, and told me they were her father's. My grandfather died of lung cancer five months before I was born, so all I know of him are the stories, and the pictures.
He was a Bohemian immigrant at the turn of the last century. He almost didn't make it here. His oldest sister came first, earned money for her father to come, and the two of them worked to earn money for the rest of the family. Four months after the father's arrival to America, he died of injuries to his lungs from his job as a stone cutter. The family was so grief stricken that they cancelled their plans to immigrate. But, eventually they decided to come anyway.
I'd always heard my grandpa was a serious man, very honest and a hard worker. He made his own home brew, and he fished, and he hunted.
I looked at the handkerchiefs. They were long since cleaned of any trace of him. I touched the handkerchief. I somehow touched his face.
I think I love old things because when I touch them, I'm connected to the person that is gone. Somehow, that contact flies in the face of death and separation. I touch it, I think of the person, and that person is real.
I think maybe I understand why people go on pilgrimage. Not to worship an object, but be be close to the object that was close our Lord.
Maybe not. But now I know it about me.
I helped my aunt pack her things in preparation for a move. She just turned 77, and has only had two major moves in her life. In this process, she has given me little things that have been in the family for many years, because she has no room for them anymore.
Saturday, she gave me an old padded tin box, with pictures of pastures and sheep in varying shades of sepia. It sat on a bureau in their home for as long as she can remember. It was probably a biscuit box originally, but the family called it the handkerchief box. It is full of handkerchiefs; some from trips, some plain, some with fancy embroidered edges, some dreamy sheer florals.
As we looked into the box together, she came to some plain handkerchiefs, and told me they were her father's. My grandfather died of lung cancer five months before I was born, so all I know of him are the stories, and the pictures.
He was a Bohemian immigrant at the turn of the last century. He almost didn't make it here. His oldest sister came first, earned money for her father to come, and the two of them worked to earn money for the rest of the family. Four months after the father's arrival to America, he died of injuries to his lungs from his job as a stone cutter. The family was so grief stricken that they cancelled their plans to immigrate. But, eventually they decided to come anyway.
I'd always heard my grandpa was a serious man, very honest and a hard worker. He made his own home brew, and he fished, and he hunted.
I looked at the handkerchiefs. They were long since cleaned of any trace of him. I touched the handkerchief. I somehow touched his face.
I think I love old things because when I touch them, I'm connected to the person that is gone. Somehow, that contact flies in the face of death and separation. I touch it, I think of the person, and that person is real.
I think maybe I understand why people go on pilgrimage. Not to worship an object, but be be close to the object that was close our Lord.
Maybe not. But now I know it about me.
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