While I was growing up after World War II, there were minefields of tension to navigate in my family. My father spent long hours with his fledgling business, left early and came home late. He was rarely around to buffer or interpret my mother’s unpredictable behavior.
When I opened the front door after school I always entered cautiously, unsure of what lay ahead. Would Mommy be lying on the couch with a migraine or would she be throwing a pot across the kitchen? My younger brother and I kept to our own rooms as much as possible. “I’m doing homework” became my defense to be left alone; consequently I developed into an ace student.
My one place of solace was my grandmother’s tiny house. After I became skilled on a bicycle, I pedaled there often. It was a long ride, but well worth it to get such a welcome reception. Of course, Mom didn’t approve of these visits, given the tension between her and her mother. When Mom was hospitalized for a month to treat her mental disorder, even her psychiatrist discouraged these visits. I went anyway. When my mother was lost in a migraine, she didn’t even notice that her preteen daughter was missing from the house.
Nanna and Poppa were poor and had always been poor. They had raised five children in that small house. When I was growing up only the youngest was still at home, my aunt Marnie, six years older than me. My mother always complained that, as oldest daughter, she had been hard-done-by in her family, stretched thin by the Depression and then the War. But I didn’t want to hear those bitter stories. What I knew was that Nanna and Poppa’s house held warmth and love for me.
The little house sat above a dirt basement, accessible through a trap door in a corner of the kitchen. If you wanted to go down, you had to clear a storage box out of the way. Under the door rough steps descended to a single large room with a low hanging ceiling, actually the framework for the house above. The space was lit by a couple of bare bulbs.
Poppa had made a long table by setting two sheets of plywood on sawhorses. Here Nanna stored the endless treasures she bought from rummage or white elephant sales, held as fundraisers by the various churches in our community. These thrift sales, augmented by bingos, provided an endless stream of cheap trinkets, gaudy kitchenware and garish bric-a-brac. Of course this is my adult brain passing judgment, or more correctly, my mother’s adult brain. In my childhood, visiting her storeroom under the house was akin to discovering an untouched Pharaoh’s tomb.
In the austere lighting clunky depression glass glittered. Ornate, gilded picture frames gleamed. Fat ashtrays squatted beside bowls decorated with pristine mountain scenes. Tall vases waited for flowers that would never grace their colored glass. And mismatched porcelain cups and saucers sat poised for the tea that would never be poured.
One treasure especially delighted me. It was a cheap ceramic pitcher shaped like a bird, about eight inches high. Its claws perched on a bird-sized stump and its tail flowed down the back of the stump. It was painted a rainbow of colors and had an enormous beak. Nanna said it was a parrot. Both of us knew I could not take it home, so she brought it upstairs to use when I visited for milky tea and cookies.
I remember a special Christmas when we all gathered at Nanna’s house for turkey dinner. This particular year was unusual because all of Nanna’s offspring were there, even the aunt and her husband who had moved to California. In the living room card tables and folding tables butted together like a freight train to create a long eating arrangement. Nanna’s regular table, expanded with leaves, filled the kitchen. The house was wall-to-wall folding chairs borrowed from a church hall.
I was almost thirteen at the time and pulled out a chair at the table for grown-ups. Mom informed me, to my embarrassment, that the grandchildren had to sit in the kitchen. Aunt Marnie, aged eighteen, laughed at me. I can still feel the barb to this day. Marnie was like a big sister, not an aunt. She was my role model—someone who knew how to apply lipstick, shave her legs and kiss a boy. I felt betrayed by her snide chuckle that implied, “Nyah, Nyah, I’m an adult and you’re not.”
I was almost a teenager and I had to squeeze in with my younger cousins and brother at the kids’ table. Nanna, bless her heart, chose to sit with us. I have a vivid memory of Nanna pouring milk into three-year-old Moira’s glass. She was using the bird pitcher. As she tipped the over-sized beak into the glass she announced, “Watch the birdie. Watch the birdie.”
All us kids stared at the birdie while Nanna glued her eyes on Moira’s face. The glass filled to overflowing while the birdie kept pouring. I was too mesmerized to wrap my tongue around the words of warning I should have uttered. Milk rolled in rivulets across the plastic Christmas tablecloth onto our laps. Squealing, we all pushed back our chairs. All except little Moira who was stoically watching the birdie.
Although Marnie considered herself an adult, she still lived at home and Nanna commandeered her to clean up the mess under the table. I clearly remember her avoiding my eyes as she wiped the sticky floor. I stepped carefully out of the way, trying to hide my revengeful smirk. That day I got the last laugh, and I still giggle when the birdie scene springs to mind.
On the way home after that Christmas dinner I kept silent while my mother ranted about how Nanna did everything “half-cocked”; she couldn’t even pour a glass of milk properly. In the back seat my little brother and I giggled while we whispered, “Watch the birdie! Watch the birdie.”
By the time I moved to the big city to attend university, Marnie was teaching elementary school there. She had matured into a supportive big sister. She took me under her wing to visit art galleries, live theater and antique bookstores. Of course we frequented the part of town offering street after street of second-hand shops. We had both inherited Nanna’s love of a bargain.
Nanna died on my twenty-first birthday, a cosmic betrayal I have never forgiven. Instead of enjoying a coming-of-age party, I choked down sobs to keep vigil at the hospital. My last image of Nanna was lying inside an oxygen tent with one hand stretched out to clasp mine.
Marnie was twenty-seven then. She had taken sick leave from her teaching position and come home several days before me. As far as I know, she never left her mother’s side.
“Tell her some stories,” Marnie suggested. “She can’t talk, but she can hear you.”
Holding Nanna’s hand, I told her how special she was to me. I remembered things we had done together, starting with collecting beach glass on the nearby sandy shore of a big lake. Then there were the bingos where I got to choose the prize every time she won.
Of course I retold the story that had become a legend in the family: Watch the Birdie. A gurgling sound spurted from the oxygen tent; Nanna was giggling. At that point the nurse who was monitoring the equipment put an end to the family stories. She decreed that her patient had to rest now. I smiled through the scratchy plastic window and Nanna squeezed my hand tightly. That was the last time I saw her alive.
Marnie and I never talked about that farewell scene; our family was not comfortable expressing raw deep emotions. But her life changed soon after that. Poppa was so lonely, he wanted his only unmarried daughter to move back to our small town to look after him. The carefree days were over for her, and consequently our camaraderie ended as two young women exploring the big city together.
After Poppa died, Marnie sold the small house. She sorted through all of Nanna’s accumulated knick-knacks and prepared boxes for each relative. My box did not contain the notorious birdie pitcher. I think cousin Moira asked for it and that was fair. She was the only one who had followed Nanna’s instruction to “watch the birdie” to the very end.
Marnie died of cancer in her forties. I still miss her. Although I am an old woman with five grandchildren, I still feel cheated of my big sister who saw me through the insecure days of adolescence into a fulfilling adult life. I understand now that Marnie was caught in the web of family duty and compromised the possibilities for her own future in a way I never had to do. She continues to be my role model on how to accept what life throws your way with grace and generosity.
And what became of the bird pitcher? After Moira moved several times to advance her career, the birdie quietly disappeared from her life. It had probably gone in a box of junk to a thrift shop, when friends helped her pack during one of those moves. The pitcher is gracing another family’s kitchen table now. Someone, somewhere, is pouring milk from that parrot!
Thanks to Nanna I grew into a devoted thrift-store shopper. Every time I buy a used article, I try to imagine who owned the object before it came to me. Who strolled across a beach wearing the sunhat I now have on my head? Or walked in the rain with this umbrella? Or sipped tea with this
porcelain mug? In all my second-hand sleuthing I’ve never found another ceramic bird pitcher, but I’m still keeping my eyes open. My grandchildren all know the story, but it would be so much fun to re- enact it with the genuine article.