Wednesday, May 8, 2013

A funeral, a table, Grandma's tears and grandma's sandwiches... recipe three

I was four and a half when I didn't get to go to my Grandma Thelma and Grandpa Martin's funeral.  I can remember my momma being inconsolable, my dad tried to no avail.  Every one tried but no help for it she had lost her momma and couldn't bear the loss.  My dad was heart broken he had had a special relationship with both of my Grands.  My grandmother Thelma and he had had a bet about when she would become a grandmother.  I was due just after her birthday.  My dad bet that she would be only 35 when she became a grandmother and she had bet she would be 36.  I was born two days before her 36 birthday so my dad won, she had to make him a steak dinner.  I had made him a winner in one of their games.  My granddad was a rock hound and my dad had spent many a day hunting after rocks with him.  I love to hunt rocks, as does my Booboo, maybe I do have a small memory of him after all?  I had said before that they had been en route to my grandma Thelma's fathers funeral when the were killed.  They were killed in a car wreck in a late March snow storm on Stephen's pass in Washington state.  My mom has always said the night they were killed she had awoken from a dead sleep and knew something was wrong.  The time she awoke was the time of my Grandfathers death, my Grandmother had lived awhile but had not made it through, I don't believe even the ride to the hospital but not sure.  My mom doesn't talk about it much and we aren't really allowed to ask.  My great grandmother Glassey, her grandma, was at the funeral, she had just buried her husband and had to bury her daughter and son-in-law as well.  She was upset with my mother for not allowing the casket to be open.  She had gone to the viewing and taken pictures, several years after the funeral, knowing full well my mother did not want to see her mother dead, she slipped a photo into a pile of family photos just so my mother would see it.  It broke my mom's heart in a way that words can not describe, and had made my mother very upset and hurt at my Great Grandmother.  She left and did come and see us for about 5 years. 

As I said I, and we, the other kids did not attend the funeral we stayed home with Grandma Gladys, she had chosen to honor my grandparents by taking care of their only grandkids so that our parents could say their last good byes.  I don't remember much about the day, but momma and daddy sad and us kids trying Grandma Gladys patience.  She was exceptionally gentle with us, not that she wasn't always gentle with us but it was a special day after all.  My auntie "Baby" stayed as well, she was only 9 at the time she was to help Grandma with us.  Sister was one, Red was 2 and half, Silver was 3 and half, and I was as I said 4 and half.  We were a handful by any ones standard.  I remember tipping over my Grandma Thelma's coffee table, rocks flew across the floor everywhere.  It was a special table my Grandpa Martin had made my Grandma Thelma of all the small rocks he had found, cut and polished.  The center rock was a big pink heart that he had cut special to show his love for her.  (After they were buried and gone, my mom gave all of their stuff away, before she had time to really think of the loss of some of the stuff, but one of the items she did keep was a trunk.  The trunk was filled with love letters he had sent her when he had been in the Second World War and overseas.  We, children, got into them a couple of years after they died and destroyed them.  My mom was still not in a place where they meant anything to her.  I remember reading a few and so wish I had them today, I miss that they are gone and am sorrowed that they are gone by my hands.)  Anyway the table went over in a thud and rocks were everywhere.  Grandma Gladys did not yell at us.  She simple gathered us all up in her arms and wept.  She was not weeping because we had destroyed the table, it was able to be put back together.  She wept for our loss of two such wonderful people that we would truly be the lesser for not having our lives and truly never know.  They were 47 and 42 years old.  They had both quit smoking the year before because the surgeon general said they should and they wanted to live for their grandkids.  Their dog had gotten fat from all the snack that it takes to quit.  They loved us and my Grandma Gladys knew that same love for us, and how she would get to see us grow and her dear friends would not.  She cried a while then got up, and we pick up little special rocks of love.  She took us in to the kitchen and fed us.  I don't know for sure maybe there was food from the funeral but I like to think she made us her Grandma Sandwiches.  She always made them up for us and it is one of my favorite things she would make for us.  NO, peanut butter and jellies from her or cold cuts she made grandma sandwiches....   She made a day that was unbearable homey and full of the love she always had for all of us.


Grandma Sandwiches

A couple of pounds of left over meat, beef roast, pork roast, hamburger, even steak if you have it etc...... whatever you have
Several pickles, sweet or dill which ever you have or which ever you like best, she used both.
One small onion, grind all of the ingredients through your hand grinder until well mixed.
If you have a day old biscuit or a dry piece of bread throw it in makes the meat go farther.
Add.
One cup of mayonnaise, if it take more or you like your sandwich wetter, add more.
Salt and Pepper to taste, you could add spices if you can think of one you like, she didn't.

Spread on bread, slice and sever to the hunger kids pulling at your dress. Makes them smile their toothless grins as they gobble them up, maybe you can get in a cup of tea as they munch, She tried to.


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