Special Things

My aunt visited this weekend. The main purpose of the visit was to give me some items that belonged to my grandparents. They both died in August 2005. We sorted through several boxes of cookbooks. Now I have a huge stack of cookbook treasures that I can't wait to look through. Some are very old, some more recent. Some more used and others used less. Some were even made by my grandmother as she cut and taped or wrote recipes into binders marked by category. I now have two beautiful crocheted tablecloths. I have the wooden box of dominoes that their hands touched so many times...a game my brother and I often played with them during visits. I had already gotten one box full of salt and pepper shakers that my grandma collected. My aunt brought another box full of shakers to add to that. I want to display the best of them somehow soon. It is quite a collection. My aunt also brought 6 quilts. They are all handpieced, and all beautiful. Two may have even been made by my great-grandmother. I have poured over them already once. I laid each on the bed and examined the fabrics, stitching, stains. One with a particularly intricate pattern I remembered seeing at my grandparent's house. I am pretty sure it was on their bed for a time. I picked it up and suddenly caught a whiff. The smell transported me to their home. The log house retirement home of theirs near Stuart, Oklahoma. I smelled the home where they lived for almost my entire life...the home that I visited during summers and Christmases. I could close my eyes and imagine walking through the front doors. I could see every last detail of the furnishings and remember the things I saw and did there. I shed a few tears. I hope that quilt never loses it's smell. I hope it doesn't gradually begin to smell like my house as it stays here with me. I want to always be able to inhale a memory now and then.