How it all happened is a long story, much longer than the short one I’ll share today. But it’s nothing short of miraculous grace. The impossible became visible..tangible, it will take awhile for my brain to process it all. I didn’t take many pictures that day. All except one was taken outside. But my mind will never forget the things I saw or felt that day, the things I’m still feeling and sorting through.
It had almost been a year since my mothers mother had passed away and at the time they didn’t think her father would live much longer either. They had both been sick for a very long time. Yet it was a full nine months later that he finally passed. During those months my mother and I prayed and believed for restoration of their relationship. The week of his death my mother called crying, the same way she did the week her mother died. She knew in her spirit that he was dying. We knew it wouldn’t be long and so we prayed and trusted the Lord. After hearing of his passing. Her sister called and told her that he had told his pastor before he passed the things we had prayed for and longed for! God did restoration in the final hours. And I believe it was the mercy of God that had prolonged his life so that restoration would be made complete. And so with the last restorative prayer prayed, he was finally able to rest and went on to join his wife on the other side.
We knew going to the funeral wouldn’t be an option for us so we decided to go to the burial site afterwards to say our farewells. What happened next both surprised and delighted us. My mom received permission for us to go visit the house and property she had grown up on.
We headed down on a Tuesday evening to meet my mom’s sister and her husband there. They were still cleaning out the house in order to sell the property. Mom and I were both a little nervous on the trip down. It had been years since she had seen her sister and we weren’t sure how the interaction would go. But we couldn’t miss this opportunity.
We arrived at the house and walked to the back door, my aunt and her husband met us there and we exchanged greetings. There was no denying they were sisters, or that I was related too for that matter. We are all three tall, fair, freckle faced women with brunette long hair. The initial conversation was a little awkward at first but small talk ensued and one thing led to another and we began exploring the rooms together.
It’s a modest sized home, nothing that should take a very long time to see, but we toured it as if we were in a foreign country touring a famous castle. We viewed each item and room with wonder, capturing memories, soaking in what was lost. It was as if we had been transported back in time. In fact, my mother and her sister began sharing stories. It was as if each step they took unlocked a new memory. My mother’s path led her straight to her childhood room. I could almost hear her gasp when she walked in that room. She literally froze and then slowly she turned her head and said to me “This is my bed. Those are my school projects on the wall”… The room was untouched, unchanged. It was as she had left it over 40 years ago. We all stood there in the silence for a moment. The memories were thick in that room and it took a moment for us to come back to the present and resume the tour.
The next room we walked to had been children’s rooms in the past but more currently it had been the room my grandfather slept in. His bed and his music collection was in there. I immediately headed to an old stand full of every medium of music you could’ve purchased in the past 5 decades: eight tracks, cassettes, records, and cds were everywhere and an old hat sat on the top of the pile. His listening preference: bluegrass, country and southern gospel music. There were also mandolin strings scattered about. I stepped out of the room and asked my aunt about the mandolin strings. “Did he play mandolin?” I asked. Her reply, “no, he built them.” I’m certain my eye bulged a bit with amazement. “He built them?” I repeated. “Yes, she said, he could build anything.” She then began showing me all the things he had built in the house: dressers, beds, candles, lamps, pool tables, shelves, sewing table…oh and the house…he also built the house. She gave mom and I some of his hand made items to take with us. One thing she handed me was a frame he had built around a TN license plate. He had made it to remember where he came from. And now I would be taking it with me to TN. And in a way I felt as though part of my returning to the home state is part of some generational restoration still unseen and unknown.
There were a couple of other items I was especially excited to received: some of the old hymnals in the coat closet and that old hat I had seen on the music stand. I don’t know why I was so drawn to it but I immediately wanted to put it on when I saw it and I was thankful for the opportunity to have it.
We finished the house tour by looking at the kitchen. My aunt said we could take anything we wanted and I saw some recipe books on the shelf. If you know my mother, you know that she is an amazing cook. Her homestyle cooking is the best you’ll ever have. And she always told me how great a cook her mother was. She would talk of her homemade goods, especially her pies, which she would always inform me that it was pronounced (pah). My grandparents were from Fall Branch, Tennessee. They had moved to Ross County Ohio after they married to start a new life together. But they traveled back to TN once or twice a year to see their extended family. In fact, they had chosen the property they built their Ohio house on because it is one of the highest peaks in Ross county and when you stand on the property you can see rolling hills in both directions. It is beautiful.
We started walking the property. It is a little over 7 acres with a pond, a horse barn and a couple out buildings. Mom said, I want to show you were I would play or go when I needed to be alone. So we walked down the hill quite a ways stopping at the pond for a photo together, until we reached a clearing and then some woods and a creek. “This is where I would play and find solace” mom said. The creek was dried up at the moment, it was the end of summer, but it was a peaceful spot and I loved that I got to share it with her.
We walked back up the hill, both a little more winded than we’d like to admit, and talked with my aunt and her husband a little longer. We loaded up the van with a couple of items to treasure and remember the beautiful day with and then drove back to my house where my mom got to show my kids her childhood photos and things her father had handmade.
The day had been a gift. An evening full of closure that we never expected to receive, a reunion with family that had been lost to us most of our lives, and a hat…an old hat that now rides through the hills of TN remembering where it came from, happy to be home.
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