A Birthday Tribute to my Grandmother...
My beloved grandmother first opened her eyes upon this world one hundred years ago today. One hundred years is an impossible amount of time.When I cast my mind backwards to span a century, I see time unravel behind me like a spool of delicate, meandering thread. It stretches infinitely, beyond my line of sight, journeying through periods of joy, laughter and loss directly into a smaller, simpler time when the world was much less complex.
The term ‘village’ is not one used often here in Newfoundland. Yet it is the truest word I can find to describe Stone’s Cove, Fortune Bay. Nan was proud that visitors to this teeny settlement declared it a 'pretty' place. I love the simplicity of that. It was, for Nan, a pretty place and no grander words were needed to demonstrate her pride. That was my Nan, soft spoken and direct. There exists a black and white photo of Stone’s Cove from this time. It proudly hung in my grandparents' home for the entirety of their lives, long after resettlement changed the face of Newfoundland shorelines. It shows a jumble of houses along a hilly escarpment, huddled together like a tangle of mismatched mittens tossed willy-nilly into a drawer. These dwellings face a deep, bottlenecked harbour, a place of safety and repose from unpredictable Atlantic seas.
It was this tiny fishing settlement perched on the sea, that welcomed Nellie Hatch, my grandmother, on June 8th, 1920. I do not know if the moon greeted her, or the sun. If the sky were a tumult of clouds or if it were blue. If the winds raged and whitecaps danced upon the water or if the world settled into calm and echoed with seagulls’ cry. I do not know if my great grandmother laboured long or if her infant came easily into this place. I have no knowledge of Nan’s birth weight or if she were graced with a full head of the downy hair that she declared a plague upon her in later years. Nor do I know her birth order – was Nan the first daughter or the middle girl after Aunt Maggie? This I do know: Her birth made this world an infinitely more gentle place and ensured later blessings would rain down upon the life of her grandchildren.
Nan’s family consisted of six children. Her father, George Hatch, died during his wife’s sixth pregnancy with his final daughter, Sadie. Nan was a mere slip of a girl at his death but I recall her talking of a long, bedridden illness. The only picture that I have of George shows a slight, sombre, fair haired man, unsmiling as was the fashion of photos from that time. He looks impossibly young in his crooked bowtie but a kind softness seems to hide in his features, peeking out like a sleep-tousled child from behind a bedtime door. I like to imagine his face broken by a wide smile on this day, one hundred years ago. I envision a mischievous pride that delights in Nan’s arrival. More than that, I pray that he loved her fully and well, without measure, before he had to leave her.
For his death left a widow and six small children in a time when survival necessitated the arduous work of both wife and husband. I am certain that gut-wrenching decisions were made because of this hardship. For example, Nan adored her brothers, Alan, Jordan, and Thomas and spoke with quivering sadness of watching them leave for a Boys’ Home when times were especially tough. My great-grandmother, ironically named Charity, accepted none. Instead she raised vegetable gardens, coaxing potatoes and carrots from rock-strewn hilltops, and goats for milk and flesh. Many the Stone’s Cove baby was feed with the milk raised by my great grandmother. She also housed the community’s teachers and visiting doctors in order to feed her brood of children. I see her with sun speckled face and proud, strong back, of necessity indomitable and no-nonsense. Firm and unbending, like the sinkers along the shore.
Nan, like her mom, was no stranger to hard work. In early settlements all hands contributed to ensure the world kept turning. Nan kneaded bread from the age that she could "just reach the chair." I for one, was quite thankful for this skill in later years! Nan’s bread was divine. Even on the one occasion that she declared it had over-risen and there were “holes big enough to lie down in” throughout the dough. I can still hear her laughter on that day. She learned early that you must "wring out your rag until it was almost dry" before wiping up the floor on hands and knees. As a small child, she heaved water to thirsty animals, drank goats' milk and turned the fish with the women at the flake. Nan was never one to complain, instead she shared these stories with pride and happiness. She sometimes wondered though if her mom were not just a little hard on her and if perhaps the lion’s share of the work fell to her instead of her sisters.
My Nan and my Pop were paired from a very tender age. While essentially children, they
both knew, and the village knew, that they were for each other, the way sun is for sky and fish is for water. I recognise that that unwavering truth, that knowing, sustained them both – she the fatherless girl, and he, the motherless boy. It provided sustenance for the entirety of their lives. For nearly seventy years they loved each other and the family that they created with a bottomless and joyful love, unfathomable as the deepest abyss of sea.
Here are the things that I know for sure. I know that Nan loved Stone's Cove. She knew its' every path and rock and tree. I know that her grandfather had a long white beard. I know that she was proud of her mother because her family was never hungry. That she made the most incredible apple pies. She called each of her grandchildren, "my pretty" on some occasion or another. Her flower garden was a riot of vivid color. When she laughed, she threw her head back and laid her open palm upon your arm or your leg, whatever she could reach. She hated to miss 'All My Children.' She also hated her soft, downy hair and loved Pop, heart and soul.
More than any of this, I know that she was wonderful. Everything that a nanny should be. I know that her heart held a quiet, gentle strength that helped sustain two lost children when their parents went in opposite directions.
And I know this:
My heart sings today with loving her!
I rejoice her life.
I am filled with gratitude that she was mine and I was hers.
Happy Birthday, most cherished Grandmother.
