Memories of My Grandmother

Gertrude Selma Sealy (1892-1986)

Frank Farnham Scott (1894-1961)

maternal grandparents 

 

As I was growing up, I often spent a night or two with my grandmother. It was something I always enjoyed. But there was another reason, too. I have a memory of telling my mother I didn’t want Grandma to be lonely. That was after she and my grandfather separated when I was about 10 years old. I never really knew why.

 

Grandma and I always had fun together. Sometimes she made tea for us in her cobalt blue and gold teapot. I have it now. It’s a little worn and the spout is chipped from years of use, but every time I look at it I picture us sitting at her dining room table having tea and cookies together. She kept the cookies in a large, clear glass cookie jar on the kitchen counter. My favorite was her big, soft sugar cookies. Any time I was there, I always looked to see if she had made a batch. If she had, I knew I would be getting at least two.

 

Gertrude Sealy Scott, c. 1947 − about age 55

Left: Grandma's original cookie recipe was a bit vague. I added notes after some trial and error but they never turned out like hers.  Right: The blue and gold teapot.

 

In the summer, we usually walked around Grandma's yard to look at her flowers. She had pink flocks, brilliant orange poppies, yellow primroses, orange tiger lilies with tiny black spots on the petals, pink peonies, and a beautiful Peace rose that was cream and light yellow with pink edges. I think that was her favorite. There were also sweet peas growing on the wire fence along the back of the property. Grandma used to pick them and put them in a flower frog in a low, round vase in the middle of the dining room table. I liked watching the flowers change from deep pink to a mix of pink, lavender, and purple as the days went by.

 

Poppies in my front yard - May 2020

Sometimes we looked at the old family photos Grandma kept in a drawer in her buffet. They always ended up scattered all over the dining room table while she told me about the people and places in them. One of Grandpa’s hobbies was photography, so he had taken many of those photographs over the years, even before my mother was born in 1923. Fortunately, Grandma wrote names and dates on the backs of the majority of them. Years later, my mother and I were able to identify many of the unnamed people thanks to my grandmother’s diligence long ago.

At some point, Grandma taught me how to play canasta. When the weather was warm, we would set up her card table and two chairs on the veranda. I liked playing on the card table. If I couldn’t hold all the cards in my hand, I would stand them up in the crack between the wooden edge and soft cover of the table. 

 

The veranda where Grandma and I played canasta - 55 W. Livingston Ave, Celoron, NY.

 

Looking at that roof reminds me of the time I went to see Grandma when I was in my twenties, sometime in the early 1970s. When I pulled up, I was horrified to see her standing on the roof of the veranda wearing a dress, as she always did, and her chunky-heeled shoes. She had taken the heavy, wood-framed storm window out of the window facing the street and was putting in the screen. Grandma was short, or maybe I should say "petite." At most, she might have been five feet tall and the window was at least that.  Thinking back on the scene, I'm not at all surprised my grandmother hadn't asked my Uncle Jerry or my father to make the switch. Grandma was an independent, determined woman and by then she had lived alone for over ten years. If she could find a way to do something herself, she would. 

 

Grandma's house holds some good memories. The stairs going up to it play a part in another one. At some point during my visits with my grandmother, we always played the baby grand piano Grandpa bought for her. She told me it was delivered to the house by one man. According to her, he carried the piano on his back from the street into the house, climbing ten steps in the process. It had to have weighed 500-600 pounds. Even as a child, I found it astonishing that he could have done that but he must have had some kind of system that worked for him.

The Settergren baby grand piano Grandpa bought for Grandma. The photo on the piano is of my Uncle Jerry.

Grandma kept her sheet music in the piano bench. We sang along while she played songs like “Bill Bailey, Won’t You Please Come Home” and others. “Chopsticks” became a favorite after she taught me to play that. I eventually ended up taking piano lessons for six years – from third through eighth grades – undoubtedly inspired by my grandmother.

The time I spent with my grandmother had a huge impact on my adult life. I’ve had a flower garden in every house I’ve lived in. Orange poppies and lilies are among my favorite flowers, and I still enjoy seeing the color variations on fading sweet peas. While I don’t play the piano or canasta anymore, I work or walk around in my garden almost every day except in the winter.

 

Then there are the photos. They have proved to be invaluable in my family research, shedding light on relationships, as well as letting me see what many of my ancestors actually looked like. Those photos, along with the pictures of the places my ancestors lived and worked, make the stories Grandma told me come to life. Even though I didn’t realize it was happening – and she might not have known it either – every time we were together my grandmother was instilling in me an appreciation for flowers, family history, and big, soft sugar cookies. What a wonderful legacy.

 

 

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Bradish-Scott Family History - January 2020