Wedding at Gramma's House

This weekend the whole family, brothers-in-laws included, caravaned up to Maryland for our cousin Sarah's east coast wedding reception. Sarah's always dreamed of getting married at our gramma's house--an early 19th century big, white farmhouse with as much character as one of Dorothea Lange's migrants' faces. We drove in the dark to get there--honked our horn along the windy road named after my ancestors--more out of respect for the past than the fear of oncoming traffic. Stepping out of the car I smelled, really for the first time, the outside of Gramma's house. It was a combination of fresh, green leaves and the musky house--only Gramma's yard. My aunt Leila's done a beautiful job restoring the house--but it still retains its muskiness, and immediately floods my family's minds with memories. Sarah made sure to fill the top drawer of the dining room bureau with York peppermint patties and assorted Hershey's bars--she knew we'd have to check at some point.

What we all mostly remember about Gramma's house is rummaging--hours and hours spent trying out the old typewriter upstairs, inspecting 1940s LIFE magazines, discovering photos of Dad growing up, or Granddad in his army days, my sisters and I admiring ourselves in oversized flapper dresses, sometimes finding real treasures and asking Gramma if we could keep them. I didn't realize till we visited her gravestone than Gramma died 10 years ago. I think time is catching up with me, now that I'm a 24-year-old. Most people want to live longer but don't mind that they weren't born a few years earlier, but I'm a little dissappointed I don't have as many memories with my Gramma as some of my sisters and cousins do.

I'm reading "The Wisdom of Confucius" these days :) (that's so trendy, I know). Listen to this:

"The superior man, while his parents are alive, reverently nourishes them; and, when they are dead, reverently sacrifices to them. His thought to the end of his life is how not to disgrace them. The saying that a superior man mourns all his life for his parents has reference to the day of their death. That he does not do his ordinary work on that day does not mean that it would be unpropitious to do so; it means that on that day his thoughts are occupied with them, and he does not dare to occupy himself, as on other days, with his private and personal affairs."

It seems very human to revere the dead--to still respect them. Your ancestors you never knew--to listen to their stories and stand amazed that their genes still live in you. To carefully place new flowers on their grave and bless them still.