how sweet the sound
i have occasionally referred to my almost 91 year old gran…who came to visit us in the okanagan valley this past summer, who is using crest whitening strips, who loves jasper and his bright blue eyes.
but there was another gran..my dad’s mum. florence. grandma. who also lived a long life.
when i lived in vancouver in 1996/97, i maybe visited grandma, who was in a long term care residence there four times. i was working like a dog, didn’t have a car, all sorts of excuses. but i did see her after the spring semester had started, and confessed that i had met someone different. she was sleeping, but it felt good to tell someone about this overwhelming, wonderful new love, yes, that wasn’t too strong a word for it. i thought i loved someone i had never met. was that possible. even worse, he was married.
by the time i was getting married, grandma was blind in both eyes, and the one time i visited her in 1998, she didn’t have much memory of who i was. but for the few minutes she was awake, she was so pleasant to me, even though she didn’t know me. as with so many older people, her memory of her childhood was precise and crisp, so she started to tell me a story about her days in rossland.
i made a final trip back to vancouver in the spring before my wedding, and went to visit grandma with pam and mum. she seemed to be asleep.
we were holding her hands and telling her about our lives, pam married, me about to be married, when all of a sudden, remembering grandma’s excellent long term memory and her lifelong involvement in the salvation army, i told pam and mum that we were going to sing a song. and i launched into
amazing grace, how sweet the sound
that saved a wretch like me!
i once was lost, but now i’m found
was blind, but now i see
and we were stumbling into the second verse, when grandmas lips began moving, and her voice, which i hadn’t heard for years, singing that declaring verse,
through many dangers, toils and fears
we have already come
she remembered it. she could hear us! she could respond!
pam and i had tears pouring down our faces, while mum, who probably has the best voice of us all, kept soldiering on with grandma…
and from there, we sang holy holy holy, onward Christian soldiers (grandma knew the words to that one better than we did), praise God from whom all blessings flow, and as many old-time hymns that we could recall. and our tears continued as grandma sang them all. who knows what she was thinking, if in her mind she was trussed up in her cape and hat and suit, convincing sinners, won’t you come? or if her mind was simply recalling words from her salad days.
but they were words that had given her hope and joy over the years. those were the words coming from her mouth, not despair!
with our goodbye, we sang again amazing grace. as the final verse started, we wiped our wet, black rivered of mascara faces and finished
when we’ve been there ten thousand years
bright shining as the sun!
we’ve no less days, to sing God’s praise
then when we first begun
we had had our miracle. we kissed grandma, we left. a few months later, my beautiful wedding bouquet, the centrepieces, were sent to my gran’s room. my bouquet was filled with ivy, strands of blackberries, freesia, lilies, pansies and smelt glorious.
she died the next year.
i miss grandma sometimes, her unique outlook and her appreciation of the small things. grandma has been on my mind lately, as i recently read somewhere that in an effort to heighten your appreciation of something you have been among for years, talk about it as if you were describing it to a blind person. so i do. even if i am just walking along alone in the outdoors that grandma loved so much.
i have experienced so many miracles. but this day in 1999 was the first time i can remember watching one up close. and with all miracles, you can try to explain it away, but instead, you eventually just have to realise you have been given a gift. and accept it.
