Goodbye Nola B
I see her as the sailboat that was her namesake, her sails blown by the wind, toward the western horizon, toward the setting sun. For nearly twenty years, she’s been mostly silent, and I have missed her all this time.
For these long years, I have thought that God should have mercy and let her die, that perhaps this slow death was punishment for sins. But today, I believe that the stillness he granted her these last years was a mercy of its own, a mercy that stilled the pain of memory, that stilled the lashing tongue.
My grandmother inspired me to write. She said so many times, “You should write the family history, Ann Marie.” Her stories seemed more a soap opera than things that would happen in real life. But when I finally reached an age where I was ready to write the stories, she was no longer able to tell them. Her history became a fiction, but I’m alright with that. As objective as the historian tries to be, the truth is colored by his opinions and perceptions, and fiction taints fact the moment he takes pen to paper.
So my memory of her remains incomplete and bittersweet. I see her as that sailboat, and as the magnolia tree, chopped down, but living still, all these years. Goodbye, Grandma.
August 11th, 2010 at 11:51 am
I think she finally did sneak out of that place in that truck.
August 22nd, 2010 at 8:35 am
She is indeed on the road again.