Obviously I do if you read my posts on the baskets. Every time I use one I am reminded of my grandmother, my mother and my dearest friend, my Aunt Emily.
She was (well, I guess she still is) my mother's younger sister. She was an amazing person - worked in Washington, D.C., acted as a courier for sensitive documents during the war ("who would suspect a young woman of doing something important" she told me when I asked) and traveled the world with my grandmother on her vacations. She rode camels, sailed around the Horn and just generally kicked the ass of every stereotype in existence - all the while being the perfect lady.
She actually ended up in D.C. because she went to take a government test with a male friend of hers just to be moral support. She got the job. He didn't!
I can't begin to accurately describe her really - for starters she was one of the least judgmental people I have ever known. She was able to talk with anyone from a congressman to a truck driver. She never married and when I asked her why she opined that "there was a war on - shortage of eligible men, you know?". No matter what crazy idea I got in my head she was always there supporting me - I would like to learn to hook rugs? Next Christmas I got the whole enchilada: frame, hooks, pattern and wool. I would like to get a commercial truck driver's license? Check in hand she urged me on! Oh my god, my poor mother must have wanted to squash us both!
I could go on for half of forever about her but all this is leading up to the small things that remind me of her every time I go to my cabin.
When the dust had settled on her passing and everything had been parceled out according to her desires no one wanted the pots and pans and utensils from her kitchen. Yeah, they were very well used - not to say pretty much worn out. We're dealing with a dyed in the wool Yankee here: some of the knives were so thin from being sharpened hundreds of times that you probably could have snapped them in half. And some items were of a design not seen in probably 50 years!
So I gathered some of them up and took them to my cabin in Maine.
Some of the pots I use every time I cook and other things were just so cool that I had to use them for decoration! Take a good look left to right. Who now has a spatula that you can scoop something up with and hold so the fat drains off through a hole? Just me! And a flat whisk? Stir, whisk, strain, you name it and it does it. The single mixer? Look closely - it's made so you can push up and down and it rides up on the shaft and turns to whip up whatever needs whipping up. The big knife and the ice pick are just that: big knife, ice pick.
It was a standing joke between the two of us that we would sit at her house in "our" chairs and she would listen to all my woes and triumphs as if they were actually important. Within 15 minutes I would be yawning and totally relaxed. She would accuse me of thinking time spent with her was boring...far from it, I think that being in her presence was my safe place and god knows I loved that woman. To this day she is probably the person I miss the most as the years go by - always my first thought is to ask her or tell her or show her.
Just one more time.
What a beautifully written tribute to Aunt Emily. You were both lucky to be loved so much by someone in your lifetime. Thank you for sharing with me.
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