As I mentioned on Saturday, I spent most of last weekend clearing out my grandparents’ house. My grandmother passed away in September 2001 and my grandfather’s been recently sentenced to live out the remainder of his days in a home. She has been dearly missed and now he is too since dementia’s started to rob him of his memories and, essentially, his life. It was so strange to walk into their home and pack things up. At times, it was hard to remember that he is still alive while divvying up all their collected possessions between four children (two with long-standing spouses, seven grandchildren and two great-grandkids. Other times, it was hard to remember that she is gone. Sharing our experiences out loud with one another, punctuated with laughter and a million “remember when”s, it felt like no time had passed since my childhood and, at the same time, it felt like an eternity.
My grandmother was the glue that held us all together. No one defy Nannie in her insistence that we all gather for Easter, Mothers & Fathers Day, birthdays, Thanksgiving, several other dates and events and especially Christmas. She was crazy for Christmas. Come December, the house was full of decorations, some of them as old as the house itself. She was particularly fond of those of the musical variety. Anything that sang or played music was put out with pride and one of my favourite holiday memories is of the times when she and I would team up to set all off, playing simultaneously, creating an awful out of tune racket for the sole benefit of the family’s very own Scrooge representative: my father.
Obnoxious sounds were not limited to the holiday season, however. While the distinguished grandfather clock rang every hour and on the half, so did the chirping of random birds as well as the reliable cuckoo. There were singing ornaments, bells, jewelry boxes and, well, you can imagine. There were no limits.
After she died, the clocks kept time, but everything else fell silent. No more lullaby music, the music boxes were never wound again and the wind chimes were never brought in during the winter and found no replacement when they fell apart as a result.
Herein lies my story.
Shortly after my grandmother passed away, I woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of the tinkling of bells. At the time I lived in a townhouse and my room shared a window with the common courtyard. At first, I didn’t think anything of what I was hearing. I just laid there listening, thinking it sounded beautiful. As I came to and started to think about the situation, I realized that it was quite late at night – I can’t remember exactly, but, perhaps two or three in the morning? No way was someone ringing bells outside my window at that hour and, the more thought I put into it, the more I realized that there weren’t chimes outside. I got out of bed and snuck a peek through my blinds. Nothing. The sound just carried on. Not satisfied with my investigation, I left my room, snuck past that of my roommate and opened our front door. When I went outside, I was met by silence. I inched over to the window where I was sure I had heard the bells. Again, nothing. I eventually made my way back to bed and never heard that ringing again.
At the time, I was having a really hard time dealing with the loss of my grandmother. She was the first person I was close to who had died. I was perpetually sad about it and missing her. I’m not really one for ghost lore. Ghost shows really kind of freak me out. This time, however, it gave me comfort to think that my grandmother had been there ringing her bells. It made me feel better.
I’d forgotten that happened until this weekend.
Sunday was the day that all the family gathered to loot the house. Saturday was more productive. I met my mom there with the intention of cleaning up. As we moved from room to room and dealt with what should be kept, what could be thrown out and what someone (and who) might want to keep, we stumbled on a lot of great memories and a lot of stuff. I spent some time in what we used to call the “back bedroom” lugging all the Christmas decorations out and displaying them to make it easier for aunts, uncles and cousins to choose what they wanted. I completed that and moved onto other tasks, but later, we both went back to survey the scene. As we walked in, one of the musical ornaments, placed far across the room, out of each of our reaches, just started playing. We both froze. After a second, once it had registered to both of us, our eyes locked and we just smiled at one another both thinking, I’m sure, ‘could it be???’
“It’s Nannie,” I said. My mom laughed and agreed, but I’m not sure she was completely on board with my thinking.
Later, we were both working in the bedroom that my grandparents had shared. Both beds were left made and immaculate aside from the fact that they were both so overly used and should have been replaced long ago. My mom sat on the floor and I was at the vanity, looking through the alternately gorgeously precious and gaudily costume jewelry that my grandmother had collected over her 74 years.
“Look! Pearls! Remember how long I’ve been wanting a strand!?!” I exclaimed to my mother. She responded distractedly, but acknowledged my discovery nonetheless.
“Can I take them?” I asked.
Immediately, as though an answer of it’s own, the jewelry box within grasp started playing music.
This time, there was no freezing. I immediately looked at my mom and she at me and we laughed.
“Hi, Nannie!” I said.
“Well,” my mom said. “There’s your answer.”
I’m not sure if she was saying that I should keep them or if she was condemning me for taking what someone else might want, but, for the second time since I lost her, I felt certain that she was there with me and I can’t ever explain how great a feeling that was.
P.S. I took them. I also took some really obnoxious Christmas ornaments and if they all start singing sometime in the middle of the night down the road then maybe I’ll consider offering my heirloom pearls up to someone else. For now, I’m totally cool with hogging them.
