“Hello,
dear,” she said distractedly, “I need to see your grandmother, if
you please.”
“Come
in, Penny!” Nana called from the pantry, “You're just in time for
tea!”
“Mark
my words, child,” Aunt Penelope said as she swept through the door,
petticoats rustling and long skirts swirling around her delicate
ankles, “Timing is everything in life!”
“Yes'm,”
I said obediently, “Everybody's on the sunporch.”
She
nodded, handed over her umbrella, and crossed the kitchen and living
room in quick, light, spirited steps. There wasn't much to my Aunt
Penelope - she stood barely 5 feet and couldn't have weighed more
than 100 pounds straight out of the sea - she was tiny all over with
a 20 inch waist that was the envy of the island women and doll-like
hands and feet that many would have killed for. Worse, she was
genuinely sweet-natured, happily married, cheerful to a fault, and
impossible to dislike, a modest woman of modest means who was always
in shirtwaists and long skirts, always with an umbrella under one
arm, always with a smile for everyone she met .In many ways, she had never quite all the way left the 1920's – she tended home and hearth and husband with a remarkable energy and focus and, as the ladies liked to say, Cap'n Jack was in need of all she had to spare.
Cap'n
Jack drank. To excess. Every day. He was a bear of a man, towering
over his dainty wife by feet rather than inches, easily out weighing
her by twice, maybe more. He was as dark as she was fair, as inward
as she was outward. He rarely ventured off their four acres,
preferring the company of his farm animals to that of the villagers
and that of his wife to his farm animals. If ever there was a happy,
harmless drunk, it was Cap'n Jack. On the single occasions that one
of the island women had gently suggested she leave him, Aunt Penelope
had been visibly shocked.
“Leave
Jack?” she'd asked, wide eyed with feigned innocence, “Why, I'd
sooner die! The man would be as lost without me as I'd be without
him! And where would I go, pray tell? I think the world and all of
you, Clara, but you'd be best tendin' your own garden and let me tend
mine!”
Miz
Clara had blushed and protested that she'd meant no harm and Aunt
Penelope had just smiled.
“I
know you meant well,” she relented, “but I reckon I know what's
best for me and Jack. No need for you to worry.”
In
the interests of peace, the subject wasn't raised again. The island
way was to speak your mind and move on, regardless of how your words
were received. It was a valuable lesson.
I never did know what Aunt Penelope had come for that day. Nana shut the sunporch door and she and the women clustered around the little table by the windows, solemn and serious-faced, speaking in lowered voices for the better part of an hour. When the factory whistle blew at five, they broke up, each woman giving Aunt Penelope a hug and then leaving one by one by the side door. Whatever the crisis had been, it had been confronted, dealt with and dismissed. Unity was also the island way.
Some ten years later, Cap'n Jack's drinking caught up with him, overcame his liver and then in a matter of a week or two, took his life. He died at home on his four acres with Aunt Penelope by his bedside. She never faltered, never wavered, never would hear a word against him even after his death and to no one's real surprise, turned down a cemetery plot at the Baptist church and with John Sullivan's help, quietly buried him at the edge of the property, planting wildflowers on his grave and decorating it with driftwood. On clear days, when the sunshine fell onto the grave, the driftwood shone, the flowers bloomed, and the memories stayed sweet.
"When it comes to lovin' and bein' loyal, " Nana remarked, decades before the concept of denial became commonplace, "I reckon we all see what we want to and pass over the parts that ain't so pretty."
I never did know what Aunt Penelope had come for that day. Nana shut the sunporch door and she and the women clustered around the little table by the windows, solemn and serious-faced, speaking in lowered voices for the better part of an hour. When the factory whistle blew at five, they broke up, each woman giving Aunt Penelope a hug and then leaving one by one by the side door. Whatever the crisis had been, it had been confronted, dealt with and dismissed. Unity was also the island way.
Some ten years later, Cap'n Jack's drinking caught up with him, overcame his liver and then in a matter of a week or two, took his life. He died at home on his four acres with Aunt Penelope by his bedside. She never faltered, never wavered, never would hear a word against him even after his death and to no one's real surprise, turned down a cemetery plot at the Baptist church and with John Sullivan's help, quietly buried him at the edge of the property, planting wildflowers on his grave and decorating it with driftwood. On clear days, when the sunshine fell onto the grave, the driftwood shone, the flowers bloomed, and the memories stayed sweet.
"When it comes to lovin' and bein' loyal, " Nana remarked, decades before the concept of denial became commonplace, "I reckon we all see what we want to and pass over the parts that ain't so pretty."
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