TheBanyanTree: IF WALLS COULD TALK*.

[Sharon Mack]

IF WALLS COULD TALK*.

I hadn't been back to New England since my grandmother's death.  It was one of the hardest, saddest times of my life.  We didn't bury her in her beloved New England; instead we took her back to Baltimore so that she could rest with us, the family.  I wondered if we had done the right thing.

I didn't have any business in Pittsfield, in fact, I had come quite a ways out of my way, but I wanted to come.  Something mysterious had drawn me.  I wanted to see the house once more where my younger cousin, Dustin and I, had spent so many summers and even some holidays since we were 10 and 13.  I had heard from my Uncle Patrick that they were planning to tear it down soon.

Driving slowly down Newell Street, even before I crossed the small bridge over the Housatonic River, I could see its rooftop of steely gray shingles, now with many torn off or blown off in the harsh winter winds.  I heaved a heavy sigh!  If the walls could only talk, they would tell the story of our childhood days spent in the warmth of that home; of the laughter and the good smells from my Grandmother's kitchen.  I thought of Eda and her son Johnny and what good times we had when they arrived from Florida and stayed in the other half of the house.  My Grandmother used to say that the house knew when Eda was coming.  It seemed at rest and smiling while we all awaited her arrival.  It felt easier to clean and preparations came so easily.  It was as though the house came to life.  I felt that life and I knew she was right.

I crossed the bridge and pulled into the driveway.  The back door to what had been my Grandmother's back porch hung broken and tattered on one hinge.  There was no glass left in the door or any of the windows, leaves and brush, carried in by the wind littered the floor.  The green of the once bright carpet was dirtied and in shreds.  I went in.

The back door to the house was locked*I smiled at the irony.  The glass had long been broken.  I went into the kitchen.  There was no furniture and the floors resembled the floor of the porch.  The old refrigerator was turned against the wall.  The stove was long gone and where the kitchen sink had been was now a hole.  The floorboards surrounding it were broken and weak.  I could feel the give under my feet and hear a slight crackle.  I backed away.

The living room was a tad better.  The carpet, though worn and dirty was still in tact.  The front door leading from the living room onto the closed-in front porch that connected the two sides of the house was missing and I walked through. Eda's side looked no different.  As I walked through her side, I remembered how kind Eda had always been, to my Grandmother, to me, to Dust, to my Aunts and Uncles.  She was especially kind to my Uncle Patrick.  Johnny and Uncle Pat had been musicians together back in the day.  I smiled remembering the practice sessions at Christmas time when the old band, Jack the Dog, would come back home to Pittsfield from their various lives.  They would jam until the very walls would shake.  There was always a reunion gig at LaCocina's, the bar where they had become the local favorites.  It was usually on Christmas night and the only time they let whole families in to hear the band.  Dustin and I thought it a really big deal to be going to the bar to hear our Uncle play.  Grandma would sit grinning from ear to ear and Eda and she would burst with pride as they watched their sons.  There was a lot of hope then.

I moved back through to my Grandmother's side.  Most of the stairs were missing, but I wanted to go up to our old room just once more.  I picked my way carefully over the broken stairs testing carefully the ones that remained making sure they would hold my weight.  When I got to the top I turned first to the right and peaked into Grandmother's room.  I was surprised to see her old double bed still there.  A bird fluttered out into the cold winter day through one of the broken windows.  It was as startled as I was.  Then I turned back and went to our room.

It was funny.  Dust and I always referred to it as "our" room.  Uncle Patrick and Uncle Phil always referred to it as their room.  Grandma called it, "the boys'" room.  I guess she wanted to cover all her bases.  The old bed was still here, too, and so was the old desk.  The windows weren't broken in this room  for some reason.  Suddenly I felt drained.  My body and my soul felt weary from all the old memories crowding in.  I laid down on the bed breathing the cold air deep into my lungs.  I closed my eyes.

Suddenly, as I lay there almost asleep, the gray clouds opened up and a shaft of sunlight came through the window.  It lay across my chest and spilled into the doorway.  I heard my Grandma call me.  I froze.

"T," she called.  "T.C., what are you doing on the bed with your street clothes on?"

I started to sit up and then I heard her laugh.

"Glad to see you boy*glad to see you still know where the joy was."

I smelled her bath powder and then pies baking and I wanted to cry.

"Don't do that," she whispered.  "It's time to go anyway, your mother's waiting*..be good and remember our ways*.give them to your own children.  I love you!"

And then as quickly as it came it was gone.  The clouds closed in and only gray filled the room.  Suddenly I was chilled.  

As I drove onto East Street, I looked back at the house.  It seemed less sad somehow.  I don't know.  Maybe it was just my imagination.