Every now and then I think back to visiting my grandma, who lived in downtown Detroit.
I was about eight or so and my mother would take me to a bus stop that would make the trek 30-plus miles to West Grand Boulevard. I’d sit right behind the driver, usually an African American man who kept track of me and always got me to the stop where my grandma was waiting for me.
Maybe that’s why I’m nervous about taking buses now, I don’t have my person getting me there or waiting for me.
I always remember my grandma making oatmeal for breakfast. A bowl of sugar was on the table. I’d scoop a good three spoonfuls onto my oatmeal, then eat the top layer, then scoop more sugar onto the remaining oatmeal, eat the new top layer, only to repeat until it was gone. No wonder I’m a sugar addict!
Grandma would make Ritz cracker sandwiches with peanut butter in them to take as snacks when she took me to the grand Fisher Theater in Downtown Detroit, which was within walking distance from her place. It had 2,715 seats and a tall red velvet curtain that would open dramatically on the screen that seemed gigantic to me. The first film I remember was “Windjammer,” a 1958 documentary that recorded a 17,500-nautical-mile of the sail training ship Christian Radich. What I remember most was the beauty of the sails and how handsome the young crew was.
I wondered what other grandmothers made their grandchildren.
One friend, Eugene, said his grandmother never cooked. The help cooked. His grandmother was from a prominent family in South Carolina who hated him because he was a little person. His aunt had a son and when his grandmother took them out, she would buy Eugene’s cousin a toy but not him. Eugene said, “She’d give him ice cream and me, nothing. When I asked about it, she told me to “‘Shut up.’”
“She thought I was the ruination of her daughter, my mother.”
Eugene’s memory of his grandmother made me grateful for my father’s mother. I have a vague memory of my mom’s mother, who I think stayed with us for a short time, where she died. I was 5 years old. I thought my parents buried her in the backyard.
My friend Marsha told me about her grandmother. “She was born in 1890 and came to the U.S. from Sweden when she was 6 years old. She lived in the in-law apartment, which I accessed through the back of the broom closet. It also had a front door for everyone else.”
“She cooked boiled frankfurters and boiled chicken wings, but mostly she baked. She baked banana bread, Swedish coffee cake, bread and cinnamon rolls.”
When Marsha told me that, it made sense why Marsha always bakes banana bread.
Penny told me that she loved her grandmother’s green beans. “She put bacon with them and she grew the beans in her garden. Her daily journal recorded how many caterpillars she plucked off the beans each time she went to the garden.”
Lisa told about the tuna melts her grandmother from Salt Lake City, Utah made. “They were funny tuna melts. It was tuna salad on half a Wonder Bread hamburger bun with Kraft single cheese slices. Pickles on the side. My cousin and I still reminisce over these when we get together.”
Glen’s grandmother was one of 10 children. Five of whom, including his mom, were born in New York and the first five were born in Romania. His grandmother cooked pot roast, chopped liver and “baked killer cookies; shortbread with walnuts and Mandel bread, a twice baked cookie that is similar to biscotti.”
Cyndi’s grandma made Irish fried cabbage with sour cream. “She grew the cabbage herself at her place in Lincoln, California. She also made tomato soup with grilled cheese, which is still my favorite.”
What’s a girl to do? … ask my grandkids what I cooked for them. If anything!
Lucy Llewellyn Byard welcomes comments and shares. To contact her, email lucywgtd@gmail.com
