I have this memory that probably happened a million times, but I only remember it happening once. This singular occurrence of a common occurrence has stuck with me for all these years. But recently, light has been shed upon it and it's become even more special.
When I was a kid I hated the idea of sinking. I once saw the ending to the Titanic and then panicked whenever the toilet overflowed. I would run and jump on my bed and cry about the fact that the world was about to sink. This is also why I'm afraid of space, there is no end. It's just infinite falling.
This fear didn't stop me from getting the bath, or swimming in pools or the ocean. I was more than okay with all of these activities, and though Shark Week changed my perception of the ocean, I still enjoy these activities. But you bet your ass I refused to get on boats as a kid.
This problem really only came up once a year when we took our yearly vacation to South Carolina. It was a wonderful time, and I'll write more on that topic late, but part of our vacation was to go visit the fort near by. The fort that was on an island. That required taking a boat. I was not about that. Luckily, my Memaw always volunteered to stay behind.
So this is the memory. I was sitting on top of the spiral staircase, looking down at the joined living room and kitchen, Memaw was on the couch. The house was quiet for once, and the contrast between the orange sun and the shadows of the window pane was stark. We didn't speak, but I went to the cabinet in the left front corner of the living room. Inside was a collection of wine glasses, us kids drank from them as often as we could, but we had to be careful. The glasses made a high and sharp cling as I pulled one from the cabinet. Memaw heard and warned me not to break anything. I nodded in agreement, and carried on.
That's the entire memory. A single paragraph so mundane it would hardly constitute as significant, but it does. I have a lot of memories from that house, with all my cousins and siblings, my aunts and uncles, and of course, Memaw. Most are specific, some are blurs of things we did regularly like beg to go to the beach, hanging out on the porch, ghost crab hunting, etc.. But none like this.
I've always remember this evening, but since Memaw has passed away I have often lingered on this memory. Now, let me tell you how this memory became even more significant recently.
In my final classes of undergraduate we read a book by Crystal Wilkinson, and then watched a brief lecture she gave as a homework assignment. In this lecture she discussed that she writes about what she is curious about, the topics that she has a childlike eagerness to explore. She then prompted the audience to write down their top three curiosities. I made a list longer than three, then began to create spider webs from the topics, going further and becoming more specific with what I'm curious about. Then I wrote. The assignment was a minimum of three pages to explore a curiosity, I sat down and had such a good flow I wrote 9 pages.
My curiosities included how women lived in the 1800's and early 1900's, country life, and family history. I started it as just the first two curiosities: A young woman living on a farm in the 1880's. I thought I'd explore her at different ages, but then I realized I needed names for my characters. So I texted my Mom and asked for her great-aunts and uncles names, they would be old enough and my family has a knack for beautiful names. She sent me a list of the first chunk of great aunts and uncles and I ran with it. As I wrote I based it off my family's land, and then remembered the story of a young girl who died on the farm and was buried on the land. I don't know the story very well, but I decided I'd write it.
Once I had that story down I decided to continue it by jumping fifteen years into the future and covering my Memaw's youth. I told my Mom about this endeavor, and I still need to send her the draft, and I explained that I couldn't remember how the little girl actually died, but I just made it a diabetic seizure that led to a coma and eventual death. She then told me that my great grandma had seizures as a kid. She even said it was rumored that they took her to a neighbors house and dipped her in an ice bath to try and cure her. Mom thought that was crazy, but as I was simultaneously writing a novel about sisters in an asylum during the 1920s I believed it 100%. Hydrotherapy wasn't even the wildest or cruelest way doctors attempted to cure patients. Anyways, Mom told me that she stopped having them for the most part, but did suffer a single seizure after having her fifth child.
As a result, the family then never left her alone. Since my Memaw was the oldest sibling she was often given the job of staying behind when the other kids went to the pond. Mom confirmed that she didn't mind, because Memaw was an avid reader. In that moment I recalled the day she stayed behind with me but in a different light.
I remembered what Memaw was doing in the chair. I'd always thought she was watching TV, but it was so quiet in the house. She was actually reading. She was doing exactly what she'd done for her mother all those years ago. Staying behind, enjoying the peace, and reading a book while someone kept her quiet company.
I picked up the story shortly after it, and had the character that is Memaw, Dorothy, escape from the house when she could, climb up a tree, and read. I'd like to memorialize her, and thank her for providing a near infinite amount of content for me as a writer. I like history, but I love family history, especially as it relates to Memaw.
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