Thursday – Service For Almost Eight (times 2)

[ninanevermore]

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Today on my drive into work, I was thinking about my cousin Leslie. I got a call from her 82-year-old mother the other day, inviting me to come visit her. She wants to personally give away her things to insure that they don't wind up in the hands of Leslie's first husband. Her nursing-home-bound grandson, Cameron, is her next surviving kin, and his father is his next of kin. My aunt shudders at the thought of her ex son-in-law getting his hands on her wedding china or her prized doll collection. While I am not sure how much interest this man would have in such things, it means a lot to my aunt that he not get them.

"Now the china, it's a rose pattern, and I've got most of the pieces," my aunt told me. What she meant is that there is full service for 8, provided half the people leave early and won't want coffee afterward. "I'd like you to look at it, and see if you want it. It's nice, but if it doesn't suit your tastes, it won't hurt my feelings at all if you don't take it."

I don't have room for this box of china. My house is in a perpetual state of renovation, and Jeff and I already have boxes of dishes we don't use. In fact, I have a box of china that my mother-in-law gave us that at some point I labeled "China – Service for Almost 8." I don't remember what kind of pattern it is. Soon I will have service for almost 16.

I should decline the china my aunt is offering me. Still, when she asked me if I wanted the china that was given to her when she got married, I realized that Leslie would have been the one who would have gotten this china, if she were not dead.

"I would be honored to have them," I said. I want the china desperately. I don't want it because it belonged to my aunt, though I have a great deal of affection for her. I want it because it should have gone to Leslie. Leslie had no wedding china, as she eloped to begin her first two marriages, while her 3rd marriage was recognized by God, but never by any legal authority in this world. This is Leslie's china I am getting; the only set of china she ever counted on owning.

"I've got some other things I want to you look at, as well. I've got a quilt that your grandmother started and that I finished. She pieced it, you know, back in the 30's, and when it got passed along to me I put a backing on it and a border. It's not fancy, just a simple hand-stitched quilt, but I think it's sweet and your grandmother and I both worked on it."

The quilt is made from scraps of patterned flour sacks left over from the dresses my grandmother made for my mother and my aunts when they were little girls. During the Great Depression, flour companies sold their product in bags made of soft cotton in pretty prints, because the fabric could be used to make clothes for poor people who stretched every penny. They constantly changed the prints on the fabrics to encourage people to buy a lot of flour at once in order to get enough of the same pattern for a whole outfit.

I told my aunt I would love to have the quilt, as well. I have a similar, unfinished quilt of my grandmother's that was given to my mother that she, like my aunt, intended to finish. My mother died within a few years of her own mother, though, and never got around to it. As for me, I never learned to sew.

"You know, Carol and I talked about you a lot," my aunt said as the conversation grew to a close. She has always referred to Leslie by her middle name, as does most of the family. I only began calling my cousin "Leslie" after noticing that it was how she was addressed by people outside of the family, and she confessted to me that she hated the name Carol. My friends call me Leslie, she told me, only family calls me Carol. After that, I began addressing all the letters I sent her to both her names – Leslie Carol – I suppose as a way to let her know that I was both friend and family. "She loved you dearly," my aunt told me, "You were very special to her. I love you, too."

I told my aunt I love her, as well, and then cried a little after we hung up.

The call, and my upcoming trip, got me to thinking that love and grief are funny things. I hadn't seen my cousin Leslie for 5 years when she died in December. In fact, I can count the number of times we saw each other face to face in the last 20 years on one hand. We grew close over the phone and through long rambling letters decorated with cartoons we drew to amuse each other. When we were younger, we liked each other, but our age difference kept us from palling around. It was as two grown women that our relationship developed, and she became more my sister than my cousin.

Though my husband says we have no room for it, I will accept Leslie's china and treasure it. The fact that some of the cups are missing makes it more precious: it has service for eight, complete with a reminder that some people in life are just destined to leave too early, and won't be around for coffee at the close the day.


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Comments

[basketcaselady.livejournal.com]

Everything thing my treasured, the nice dishes, were always put up and away to keep them safe. When I entered my marriage, some 32 years ago, I didn't know any different. My mother-in-law taught me differently, sitting the table with her good dishes for every day family events. *You can't really enjoy them if you don't use them* she told me once. She was right :)

[basketcaselady.livejournal.com]

grrr i meant everything my mom treasured....

[neanahe.livejournal.com]

There's a lot of wisdom in that. Then again, I have a small child. I think I will let him continue to dine on the less precious plates for a few more years.