GRAND Magazine - September/October 2016 - 23
grand legacy
CONNECT WITH GRAND
Creating a legacy of laughter and lore
BY JERRY WITKOVSKY
I
've often felt that there's something wonderful about families
that pepper their conversations with a special vocabulary all their
own. Shared experiences create shared memories, often giving
rise to a unique, intimate "family language." Their telegraphic little
buzzwords, sayings and mottos sometimes link several generations
of treasured family lore. Here are a few people shared with us:
"Grandma Bessie did it!"
Our very elderly grandmother lived in our home when we were growing up during the 1950s. Whenever our parents got irritated with us
and demanded that the culprit come forward ("Who left that bike in
the middle of the driveway?!" "Who took my scissors?!"), my brother
and I invariably shouted: "Grandma Bessie!" More often than not, it
made them smile because our lies were so ridiculously transparent.
After Grandma Bessie died, we continued to blame her for everything from unflushed toilets to mislaid keys and lost TV remotes. In the
ensuing years, we bequeathed the legend of Grandma Bessie to our
children, who would use it as a buzzword to defuse our anger, usually
disproportionate, about missing household objects or minor mischief.
"Silky!"
Gramps loved telling us stories about his beloved collie, Silky. She
was the pet he had during his boyhood in the 1930s, so none of us
grandkids had ever even laid eyes on her. Nonetheless, throughout
my boyhood, whenever we'd spot a collie, my sisters and I would
get very excited and point to it, shouting "Silky, Silky!"
When we all became parents ourselves, we shared the tales of
our grandfather's brave, smart, beautiful dog with our own children, and - to the puzzlement of onlookers - our entire extended
family, to this day, continues to refer to the breed as "Silkies."
It just makes us happy.
23 GRAND
SEPTEMBER OCTOBER 2016
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of GRAND Magazine - September/October 2016
Contents
GRAND Magazine - September/October 2016 - 1
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