December 15, 2006

The List Gets Longer

Proving that I strive to be like my mother in many ways, I save every Christmas card I receive so that I can later reuse them as gift tags. Last night I was digging through the ever-growing card box looking for a cute one to put on one of Michael's gifts, when I pulled out a card with a teddy bear on it. I opened it to see who it was from and the wind was knocked out of me when I saw that it was signed, "Aunt Jo." There wasn't a date on it, but judging from what she'd written, it was the Christmas I lived in my final Columbus apartment, and she and I must have met for lunch or something - probably in German Village - shortly before she sent the card.

I moved to Atlanta four months later, and shortly thereafter she relocated permanently to Florida. Surely I must have seen her again after that, but if I did, I can't remember when or where. When she moved to Florida, she never said that she was moving there to die, that she wanted to die close to the children who loved her, but we all knew that to be the case.

I have learned more about Aunt Jo since her death than I ever did while she was alive. I suppose that's often the way it is with families; we keep each other's secrets until there is no reason to keep them any longer. She was, in many ways, the star of my mother's family. She was the one all the sisters strived to please. My mother was the popular cheerleader, but Jo was the untouchable beauty queen, airy and aloof, with an air of sophistication she must have been born with, as she couldn't possibly have learned it on a farm from her untiring workhorse of a mother. She loved to travel and her taste was exquisite. She loved theater and art and took me to several shows at the Ohio Theater. She lived for a time in Columbus' German Village and I know she was always pleased that I chose to spend several of my post-college years in the Village as well. Last Christmas my mother pulled bags of sweaters out of the attic and asked me to try some of them on. As I did, she told me that they were all Jo's; that before Jo moved to Florida, she'd asked my mom to "hold on" to quite a bit of her cold-weather wardrobe. I brought several sweaters back to Atlanta with me, including the softest cashmere sweater I've ever owned. It's Nieman's store brand and it has to be at least 20 years old, judging from the label. I take better care of that sweater than I do of anything else I own. When I wear it, she is with me, and it is as if I hold a secret over my heart.

I sat there holding the card for a few minutes, unsure what to do with it. I didn't want to rip it in half and paste the cover onto a box for a baby who wouldn't understand the significance of his aunt grabbing a card from the late aunt after whom she was partially named. So not knowing what to do, I took a picture. I stare at it, reading "love you," written in her quick script, again and again. Life gets shorter and the list of people we miss gets longer. May we all learn to hold on to what we can.

Posted by hannah at 02:57 PM