Memories can be like our favorite shoes, we keep them handy and slide into them easily when we’re ready for a walk through the past. They fit us well, these memories, and we treasure the comfort and happiness they bring to our grief.
My memories of Mary Ann are part of a magical childhood of summers spent at the farm. She was part of the landscape of fields and barns and tractors, sunshine and days of play. As a child, my aunts and uncles were extensions of my parents, guardians of safety and dispensers of cookies and ice cream and that beloved treat, Tang.
When I think of Mary Ann, I remember her clean kitchen, her strength, her special shade of lipstick, a picture on the bureau (when we dared peek in her bedroom) of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. An early morning in the shaded garden learning how to hunt for strawberries – but never daring to eat one. A plastic swimming pool under heat lamps where eggs hatched into downy chicks. She and Emmett were always there when we went to play Bingo in the church basement, their Knights of Columbus aprons tied around their waists. There were summer church picnics, too, with cake walks and cotton candy. Mary Ann was busy, always busy, doing her life’s work. I remember the time they came out to Colorado, but left unexpectedly soon because of a found lump in her breast. We were not supposed to know of those things as children. My husband and I often chuckle as we recall driving her through the streets of Colorado Springs as she read every street sign and billboard aloud.
There is one memory that is clearer than the rest, held close in my childhood heart. We went to a park in town where the trees had grown to immense proportions in my small eyes, shading us from the hot Iowa sun. I wanted to swing and Mary Ann was willing to push me. Her slight, five-foot-not-much-more frame belied her inner strength. She grabbed the seat, made sure I was holding on tightly, then pushed me high, running under the swing until I soared past the treetops. Mary Ann gave me a special gift that day as we played in the park, one that I cherish in the midst of the sadness that death so often brings. For a moment, unexpectedly, my aunt helped me touch the sky.
