Rocking Chairs and Letters
There is a moment, even in the worst familial relationship, when the distance narrows and we soften. With my grandmother, I feel it in the letters she writes me. She writes congratulations and sends news clippings she finds in the local paper. She tells me how proud she is of me, and how far my talents will carry me. As conflicted as I am, when I see a piece of manila stationery in my mailbox, I feel pierced. I see her in her house in Fayetteville, writing at the breakfast room table. The house is quiet except for the clicking of her terrier’s claws in the kitchen and the blurred noise of the old television on the kitchen counter. All around her are artifacts from her travels around the world, mixed with the bitterness and the intractable weight of her past. The husband who left her. Her daughters, who run reckless and haggard through their lives. My father, who leaves it to his wife to care for her. And I know that she loves me as best as she can. With her letters, she reaches over all the things that I cannot accept about her and touches me.
I had a similar moment with my cousin, who's pregnant with her first child, this summer during our family beach week. It was early evening, and as I walked out onto the porch I saw her sitting in a white rocking chair in the fading light, her eyes closed, her hands on her stomach, slowly rocking. Her husband rocked beside her, looking out over the street and watching the sunset and the sea oats. It was as beautiful as she’s ever been. In that moment, she looked like a mother waiting for her child. She looked peaceful. She looked like love embodied and expectant. And I was captivated, seeing the woman that she’d become. I miss the quiet mischievous girl she was and the many hours we spent together on the long hot days of summer in Greensboro. Since then, life has changed us both and we often struggle to talk to each other. I stood beside her at her wedding and felt like a stranger. But in that light, on that day, I could hardly breathe seeing how beautiful she was.
That feeling, the piercing quality of family and friends, is only possible with people who will never leave your life or its history, the ones who hurt you deepest because you will never be rid of them. I believe those moments to be a true gift of the Holy Spirit, moving through and softening all the edges of our unhappiness. When the light falls, it opens us up and we can suddenly see how much we all share, each of us human and frail and lonely. The distance may return, but those moments tag at our heels, a silent witness that the truth at our core is pure and blindingly bright.