This Woman's Work

Let me tell you a story about a life. Not mine, but a story of a girl born in Toronto in 1914. She was the daughter of a Polish immigrant and one of nine children. Yes, nine. Her father was a tailor who worked out of his home in a workroom making mens vests. The house was off of Ossington right near Queen Street. He had a horse and buggy kept in the backyard shed and there was a lane behind the house to manage the horse traffic. The girl shared a bedroom with her five sisters. She was small, thin, very pretty with shiny dark hair and blue blue eyes and was sassy and athletic. She won prizes for speed skating on Grenadier pond. She played softball and foursquare and was always outside playing every night til the streetlights came on. Her mother was a big, soft, dark haired woman. Dinner every night was some kind of soup served with bread and butter and pickles. Her father made the pickles every year and put them in a big barrel. The children ate in shifts.

Church every Sunday was a must and all the children were turned out very clean with their best clothes. Their house was heated with Quebec Heaters that had a stovepipe that went upstairs thru the bedrooms. A bed near the stovepipe was apparently coveted. Her father was a weekend drinker. This led to some bad times for the children as one can imagine.

As she grew up she went to Sunnyside in the summer and danced the evenings away at the Silver Slipper and the Palais Royale. She had a string of boyfriends, none very serious as she wanted to play the field. She was beautiful, and difficult. One boy, Francis (called Frank) was smitten with her when she was 19. He asked her to marry him and she told him to ask her again when she was 25. On her 25th birthday he came to her house and asked her father if he could ask for her hand in marriage. He agreed and they became engaged.

They got married and moved to an apartment above a store on St.Clair. The store below was her husband's plumbing store. Her husband became the first Catholic of the Toronto plumbing union. Her husband belonged to the Knights of Columbus and on one night out they met Frank Sinatra.

She had one daughter, Maureen, my mom. She had difficult times carrying pregnancies so this was a bit of a miracle. A few years later her husband, my Grandfather, bought a home on Chestnut Hills in Etobicoke. He joined the Islington Golf Club and spent a lot of time there. The pretty girl, my grandmother, was quite the lady. She had her hair and nails done every single week of her life. She kept thin and well dressed and was every inch a lady. She was also a sports fanatic and knew every Blue jay and Maple Leaf and could quote stats on every player. Every boyfriend I ever had was enamoured with her. She was an elegant smoker and liked to have a few Rye and waters on special occaisions. She always smelled of perfume and cert mints.

She was our favourite babysitter. She would sing old songs to us when we went to bed. "My Blue Heaven, Show me the way to home and Me and my Shadow". When she was done singing to my sister and I she would run down the hall to my brothers room and yell "GERONIMO!" and jump on my brother as he screamed with laughter.

She lost her husband when she was 56 and the men in her apartment building were on the prowl. She could have easily snagged a man but she was ready to be on her own. Sadly she lost her only daughter (my Mom) when her daughter was only 48. It was hard. It was out of the order of nature and she was really upset and angry.

She moved to a local retirement residence about nine years ago. We were happy in that she never would have to fear falling alone or missing a meal. It was a lovely place and I often went and we would order in pizza and she would ask me to "get Grandma a little drink" as she had a rule about never drinking alone.

She was an avid reader and sports fanatic so she said she made the ideal old person in that she was occupied and happy.

I always kidded her every time I left and said "hey you, behave yourself, no wild drinking parties and single men!" she would always say, "That's my trouble, no men to be found!"

Grams broke her pelvis about five weeks ago when she had a fall. It has been downhill since then and we knew she wasn't getting any better.

This wild, athletic, sassy, stubborn, difficult girl who became a beautiful woman and turned 93 this year told me just six months ago that inside she was still a six year old girl. That she was still the same person she was then. She still dreamed of playing hopscotch and skating on Grenadier pond and playing foursquare until the streetlights came on.

This beautiful girl died this morning.

I kissed her and told her how much I loved her. I cried and gathered her clothes for her funeral.

It was so hard to leave her room. It was the final goodbye. I stroked her face and kissed her forehead. Before I left I whispered in her ear "You be good."