A Sacred Place

Hey Y’all,

This note has been a bit tougher for me to find the words to compose.  I’m not sure why I’ve waited so long to write this, but finding the words has truly been a challenge. 

I have little gnomes living in my house.  They take the following things and hide them in the night: my hammer, my pliers, my paint lid opener, and my knife.  I hate them.

So it all started with a quest to find a pair of needle nose pliers.  

I’m not sure how such a simple task can make a grown man cry, but it did.  You see, there is one room in my house I haven’t touched yet.  I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.  And yet, it is the room I want to demolish in its entirety.  Not because it holds bad memories – no, just the contrary, some of my happiest memories were made in that room – but because it just doesn’t work for me. 

It was my grandmother’s music room.  It was a small white room sandwiched between her kitchen and formal living room closed off by two white French doors and lighted with a magnificent crystal chandelier.  All my life it held her organ, piano, and a small wicker desk. The organ has been long gone, bequeathed to my uncle – but the piano remains, promised to my mother.  And since she doesn’t have room in her house for it (yet anyway) I get it. 

And I’m so lucky I do.  You see, this piano is the only inkling of any type of musical instrument that I can play.  And at that, and after two years of lessons, I’m still horrible at it.  Maybe it was because I didn’t practice enough.  Maybe it was because these fat fingers are incapable of learning such a gift.  Maybe it was because I could never compare to my grandmother.  It is indescribable what a divine melody was created by that piano when my grandmother sat down at its keys.  I remember occasionally walking to her house and finding myself lucky enough to be a secret guest to a concert for only her and God to hear.  I could never bring myself to ring the doorbell when she was playing…only stop and listen. 

And I miss them.  God, do I miss those days. That piano deserves to have life again.  It deserves to be played only the way she could.  I hope one day that I can.  That somewhere I can find the strength and the courage to take up lessons again.  I’ll always regret she wasn’t the one to give me that gift – but she started me on that path.  And I did learn much of it from her. 

I told you that story to tell you this story.  On top of her piano was a stack of cards roughly a foot to a foot and a half in height that she never got around to putting away (she kept every card she ever got…a gift and a feat in itself).  They were all cards sent to her when she found out she had cancer.  Get well cards, thinking of you cards, birthday cards.  Cards that she didn’t put away because she either never found the time or simply didn’t want to.  Often times, she would read those cards when she was feeling rather low.   These cards have been untouched since she died.  I’ve owned her house for almost two years and it is the first time I’ve really looked at them.  I don’t know why.  Maybe it is because part of that house was still hers and sacred to me. So I sat and I read them. 

All of them. 

I read them all through blurred eyes and a God awful ugly cry.  Cards from my church family, cards from ladies I had never met, cards from family.  Cards from people that knew and loved my grandmother as much as I did and still do.  I want to thank each person who wrote those cards – hug them and let them know they mean as much to this grandson as it did the recipient of those cards.  But the gut wrenching part is I can’t thank all of them. Aunt Thelma – you were my grandmother when I lost mine, Mrs. Stockard – you treated me like one of your own when I saw you every Sunday – I can’t thank them anymore.  And that tears at my soul. I hope they know how much they meant to my grandmother – and I hope they know how much they mean to me.  But the ladies that I know and I can still see – expect a bear hug from me and expect it soon. 

The cards have been packed away, the piano has been moved, the chandelier taken down, and the walls ripped out.  But my memories of that tiny room remain.  And take heart, the piano will be a focal point in my living room, the chandelier proudly lighting my dining table, and I’ll cherish those cards for the rest of my days.

And I still haven’t found my pliers.

Warm Southern Days,

Russ