Only One Way To Get The Y

Grandma and Grandpa’s wasn’t my favorite place to go when I was a child. Every week during the summer, I’d spend at least 3 days there, probably 12 hours a week on average, sometimes much more. The food was less than delectable – with the exception of Strawberry Rhubarb pie of course. Grandma would overcook eggs over easy and put them on burnt toast. Or maybe dry out a thin flank of beef. And put it on burnt toast. Sure, there were apple juice sippy cups, but I wasn’t really a fan of apple juice either. Most often I just ate graham-crackers (another non-favorite), made belive that Cracker Jacks were delicious and sucked on freezer burned ice cubes that tasted like the last ice age.

Days at the Furst’s Warwick residence meant one of two things most times: boredom or manual labor. My brother and I, being young boys, invented countless games involving darts, a tennis ball, the putter, really, whatever ancient random crap that we could find in the garage. Or, we’d spend hours in the Grandparent’s huge pine tree, which was sort of like the maple that we’d hang out in at Murray Ave, only about a thousand times more disgusting – I’d be coated in pine tar and ants for days. It wasn’t nearly as disgusting as Grandpa’s dog, Kelly, who, supposedly born of aliens, was nothing if not hairy and gross. She’d howl, no, howl is too complimentary, she’d moan at the fire house horn every day at noon (or near noon, I don’t think it was automated), as Stephen and I whipped a tennis ball against the wall or sat in the crab apple tree – less sticky than the pine tree though with more wasps.

The other option was labor. For the longest time, it was vacuuming the floor. First, of course, you had to dump a bunch of baking soda on the carpet. Grandma would get that started for you sometimes. Then you’d suck it up as the fumes spread through the air in a hazy cloud of toxins and dog hair. Not until college did I deal with carpet’s like Grandma’s. You never took off your socks, as the floor felt like twice used double plush paint rollers between your toes. I got an envelope a few days ago. Among other scribbles, and along with a receipt for $3 grass seed from 1991, there was a note on an account. “You were always a good boy and vacuumed the floor. Thank you, Grandma,” it said. It probably contained the change that Grandma kept when she had to break a quarter to pay for the cleaning. I think that my parents, acting as labor lawyers, negotiated the 25 cent minimum wage when I was about 8. By the time I was 14, I was working for a flat rate of $20. I might wash three windows, $20. Or perhaps it was spend three days spraying sealant on 600 square feet of insect infested retainer wall in the broiling August sun. $20. I think the 30-35 bags of half frozen leaves after Thanksgiving break were gratis, sort of like Grandma cashing in her bonus card for the rest of the year’s work.

Don’t get me wrong, washing windows was no picnic, even compared to sweeping the garage floor (not dirt off the garage floor, we’d actually hose down the garage and sweep up a layer of the floor). Windex for windows? No. Try ammonia and newspaper. Even if she had Windex, I couldn’t use it, because luke warm ammonia and newspaper looked better in the end. Sure, I lost 6% of my brain cells every time I dangled from the ladder mopping dirt, spider webs and paint chips (probably lead, knowing my luck) from the crevices of her window sills with a poisoness chemical, but it was $20, and I otherwise somehow was obliged to do it.

Stephen eventually inherited my job of hacking the poor ewe bushes down to their woody nubs. That was Grandpa’s job, since it required power tools, until I was maybe 14. Retiring age, mind you, is about 20. For the last few years of Grandma’s life, I was exempt of labor. I should go take a nap, she’d suggest, I work too hard. Just like my father. Let Stephen do it. Maybe my mother could bake us a cake.

By the time I hit mandatory retirement, I had gained a new appreciation for the Grandparents Furst. For all of the boredom, we gained ingenuity. For all of the labor, we built character. They, the grandparents, were real people to the end. I mentioned when I stumbled my way through Grandma’s eulogy that she was a consummate human being, complete with imperfections. Grandpa was the same way. But they were like me, they were my people – there’s really no denying it. If I ever grow up, I’ll send my kids outside to play in the trees, maybe I’ll give them a tennis ball and tell them to go figure something out. I won’t complain when I hear something thwacking against the roof 1000 straight times 5 minutes later. If they don’t like it, I’m sure there’s some dirt that needs sweeping – in the yard. Or maybe it’s time for them to dangle from the edge of the deck to refill the squirrel proof electric bird feeder. There are some ants somewhere that need to be manually eliminated, I’m certain. Whatever the case, they’ll learn how to amuse themselves, and they’ll learn how to earn an honest living. One quarter at a time.

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