This is my Grandparent's house. The house my Mom and her siblings grew up in. The house my Uncle owns now. Back when I was a little girl this is where we had our holiday dinners. My Grandma cooking everything on that black wood fired cook stove you can see there in the front yard. Of course the stove was actually in the house by that time, just to clarify. It may have been primitive, but not that primitive. I'm not sure you can appreciate it from the picture, but folks that house was/is small. The house was small and my family.......
well it was big. (Please do not judge the oversized eye glass frames nor the 80's hair styles or fashion... it was a different time) It was about the time this picture was taken we moved our holiday meals to my Uncle's house. My Grandmother was sick with cancer and just keeping herself healthy took all her energy. There were no illusions as to why we were taking this family picture. In that time we've lost a few members and added six spouses, eight kids and a couple of girlfriends. Now we have holiday dinners at my cousin's house where there is a dining room large enough to hold us all.
Back at my Grandparent's the actual footprint of the kitchen was rather large. The whole room probably measuring somewhere around 12 X 24, but it was awkwardly laid out. With the kitchen end being somewhat narrower than the dining end. Then there was the cook stove, the amount of floor space it needed to eat up to work safely and the awkward position it was in, straddling the cooking and eating areas. Not to mention three windows and four doorways to eat up even more precious wall space.
Everywhere you turned seating was tight. At the table all us kids squished together on a long bench pushed up against the wall under the window. If you ended up sitting in the middle of the bench you were stuck there until dinner was finished unless you could wiggle your way out under the table. If you did manage to do that you'd best secure your seat in the living room because if you thought things were bad in the kitchen the living room only held one couch, a rocking chair and a squishy old arm chair. And that rocking chair, unless your name was Grandma or Grandpa, that chair wasn't for you. Now you haven't forgotten about that cook stove have you? Well trust me, if you'd been there you wouldn't be able to because that sucker had been stoked up all day cooking a veritable Polish feast. By the time dinner was over the house and by extension, all of us, were a collective seven trillion degrees. Windows and doors would be left open trying to disperse some of it. All of us kids will spill out the back door looking for a chance to drop our core temperature down a few degrees.
I often hear people say, "Oh I can't have people over my house is too small" or some such variation and it always make me shake my head. I wonder what things would have been like if my Grandparents had felt that way. Yes we probably wouldn't have sweat as much during the holidays, but I'm afraid we would have lost a lot more than that. Those squishy family dinners taught me many things; how to share, be respectful, to make my own fun and how important family is. So this Thanksgiving I give thanks for that.
I have to admit I was surprised and very touched at the response I got from Ricky's story. I can say with all honesty that he would have loved the attention. I am glad I decided to write it since I had been going back and forth on the idea. I have since realized that I should have been writing stuff like this long ago. Not only for myself, but for the girls as well. So today I'm going to continue the series with a little tale about my Grandpa John.
My Grandpa was born one of seven children to Polish immigrants in 1915. His parents had made the journey to Canada ten years prior and settled in Manitoba, where he was born. I can't say I know much about his childhood and in fact even his birth date was of some debate thanks to the poor record keeping of the time, although we always celebrated it on December 26. I do know that he grew up to be quite the handsome and stylish man in his day.
Eventually the day would come that he and my Grandma would marry and start their own family.
Now this is where the famous part of the story comes in, but it wasn't that way then. If you ever happen to find yourself at Birds Hill Provincial Park in Manitoba, follow the Old School Road past the campground trail head and you will find the Kudlowich Homestead.
Now originally this was the home of my Grandpa's brother, Great Uncle Frank and his wife. It was built by hand in 1936 by Uncle Frank, Grandpa and their youngest brother Uncle Joe. Uncle Frank lived on the farm until leaving for Ontario in 1943. It was at this point that my Grandparents moved in. All of this information is printed in the Birds Hill Provincial Park's self guiding trail pamphlet. There is more story to tell, but the version in the pamphlet and the version I had been told from my Grandpa differ just slightly.
My Grandpa was a horse man. In fact I think he'd have been happy and comfortable if the horse and wagon had remained the way for us to travel. He loved his horses and was proud of them. He fastened bells to their halters and the neighbours would know by the sound that Grandpa was coming. His horses were also well trained, knowing it was time to head for home when Grandpa would thump the side of the wagon with his hand not by him touching the reins as it is told in the pamphlet. While he was visiting neighbours their children ran past the horse and wagon accidentally bumping the side of the box as they passed and sending them home without Grandpa.
My grandparents called the homestead home for the next several years before moving to Ontario for good in the fall of 1950. The pamphlet claims they made the move in the summer of '50, but since my Mom was born in September of 1950 in Manitoba it was more likely a little bit later than that.
There are a lot of nicknames floating around this house or knick knack names as Abby calls them. Most recently I was asked about the Lou/Louie I have listed in my profile. It does seem quite a long way from Shannon and Shan, which I get most often. Not a great many people call me Lou, just Mike and I, in return, call him Lou or Louie. We do it as a way to remember Ricky, to keep him close to our hearts.
Ricky was the fourth of five kids and my Mom's younger brother. Here you can see my Aunt Josephine holding a baby Ricky in what is, to my knowledge, the only baby picture of him. The circumstances surrounding Ricky's birth have become some what of a family legend involving my grandmother delivering her fourth child and second son all by herself in a truck stuck in a ditch while my grandfather was off getting help.
I can't be sure when exactly my grandparents got the word that their son was "different". I'm sure the word institution was thrown around. The 50's were a different time and no one would have expected my grandparents to keep a child with Down's Syndrome at home, but those people would have misjudged the size of my grandmother's heart. Keep him home she did, even though it couldn't have been easy.
Time marched on and Ricky grew up. My Mom taught him how to print his name and he would spend hours filling sheets of paper with Rickety in his tiny block printing and earing himself the nickname Rickety Rick. Over time the Rickety became Ricky and eventually he was able to manage his last name. A huge feat when you consider he was Polish. His vocabulary was quite small and we had to rely on a sometimes frustratingly confusing combination of words and hand signals. With such a limited vocabulary Ricky was forced to get somewhat creative with his language. He couldn't manage to say tea, but chai would work. My Grandpa he called Pop or son. And where you and I might call someone a bonehead Ricky would use Babalouie. For him it was one of those affectionate insults.
When I started dating Mike, he and Ricky had an instant connection. In fact I'm pretty sure that Ricky loved Mike more than the rest of the family put together. Since they had such a great rapport Mike and I began spending more and more time with him, taking him to the cottage with us, watching the hockey game together or just hanging out. Since my Grandmother had passed away a few years before it was a welcome break of each other's company for both him and my Grandpa. Spending time with the younger members of the family did wonders fro Ricky. His vocabulary was beginning to grow and my Mom had looked into programs and employment for him. His bablouie had been shortened to just louie and he would use it to identify all of us, often walking into a room and announcing hello louie in much the same way Uncle Leo used to say hello Jerry on Seinfeld. Things were looking up.
The year of Ricky's 39th birthday we threw him a surprise party after completely pissing him off by pretending to forget it was his birthday at all. I can't remember exactly, but I'm sure there were some louie's muttered when he realized what he had done. The entire night we teased him about turning 40 the following year. Ricky would pinch his lips together and vigorously shake his head no. No way was he going to turn 40. The heartbreaking part was, he was right. Two months after his surprise party and a devastating two days before Christmas Ricky quietly passed away in his bed. Our entire family was shocked and heartbroken at the loss. It's hard to believe it's been nearly 14 years. Seems like yesterday. Seems like a lifetime.
It came in the open window with the breeze and instantly I was back twenty-five years. Back to that wood paneled bowling alley of a rec room in a small war time house. Eating goldfish crackers and green Christmas wreath cookies. The TV tuned to the game. The hockey game. The baseball game. Her chair beside his at one end of the room. Family spread out across couches. Cousins spread out across floors. And Grandma in her chair, the smell of her perfume in the air.
