I've told you how my mother's father (which is what the Swedish term MorFar means in English) came to America from Sweden, and shown you what a
handsome man he was.
Today, it's time for the story of my MorMor - my mother's mother - a woman every bit as beautiful as my grandfather was handsome.
I know less about my grandmother because she really didn't talk about her life. Also, she lived several hours away (until she moved to Denver to be near my aunt and uncle), whereas my grandfather lived in Syracuse near us. (They had divorced in the 70's.) My grandfather was very involved in our lives growing up, and frequently would take one of us kids out alone to have lunch, see a movie, or go window-shopping together, and he'd tell us stories about his life.
Even though they were separated for so many years, in death, they were very much together - we were preparing for the trip to Syracuse to see my grandfather in the hospital where he was in a coma dying from a heart attack, when we got the call from my mother telling us that Grandma had suddenly passed away. My poor aunt and uncle, who lived in Denver, were on their way to Syracuse to be with Grandpa as well; they actually got paged in the airport where they changed planes on the way to be informed that their mother had died back in Denver.
Grandpa died two days later. Personally, I felt that he somehow held on until everyone who was going to be able to make it to Syracuse got there. And then he passed the next morning, when no family members were with him. I hear people often do that, even if they're in a coma - wait to die until the family isn't there.
I don't know Grandma's maiden name. Her married name was Astrid Frodin. She came from Sweden sometime in the 20's, I think. I know it can't have been earlier, because as a young woman in Stockholm, she was a catalog model for a major department store.
One of our family treasures that is in my keeping is a set of pictures of Grandma, clipped from that catalog. We found them in her apartment when she was moved into a nursing home in Denver. The clippings were tucked into a fragment of an envelope with some faded blue writing on it in Swedish. None of us read Swedish, and it was a long time before I found someone who could translate it for us.
I arranged the clippings - even the envelope - on my scanner, and this is what I got (click on the picture to see the detail):
Astrid as a Young Model in StockholmThe little names beneath the pictures are the names of the fashion items she is wearing. The scan came out well; you can even see the envelope turned on its side in the bottom right-hand corner. A few years ago, I ran across a woman in the artists' studios here in Wilton who was able to translate it for me, at least roughly. It reads "Here are some pictures I found of a woman that I thought were funny." Or words to that effect. I suspect that a friend or family member may have clipped them and sent them to my grandmother, wherever she was at the time.
These are a rare treasure, and after my grandparents both died, I tried to think of a way to share them among the family members. The clippings are very fragile, but one of the pleasures comes from handling them in much their original form. I put my brain to the puzzle, and came up with creating sets of photo magnets. I bought sheets of magnetic ink-jet "paper", printed out the page several times as you see it, and cut around the clippings.
The resulting thin magnets, on handling, felt much like playing with the clippings in your hand does. I packed the sets up and sent them along to my mother. She was leaving for a trip with her brother and sister to take Grandpa's ashes and scatter them on the Pacific Coast, as he had wished. She was able to give them each a set of the magnets for their own.
I do need to re-do the magnets one of these days. I found that the set I made for myself has faded badly, even in normal household light. Technology (and the rise of computer crafting) has improved the options available. I just have to get around to it.
The other picture I have of my grandmother is a professional portrait. The folder the picture is mounted in reads "Martel-Howlett Studios", which makes me suspect she had this picture taken after she came to America. Judging from the style of her clothes, I'd guess that this was in the early 1930's.
A Stylish Young WomanThe folder is inscribed, I believe by my grandmother, "Best of viches (sic) to my friend, Astrid". My guess about the odd spelling is that it may have been a joke based on her accent when she first learned English.
Growing up, "going to grandma's house" was a summer ritual for us. We lived in an apartment in Syracuse; she lived in a country house surrounded by fields and streams in Akron, NY (near Buffalo). As a child, Grandpa was there in Akron, too; it wasn't until my teens, when we stopped going each summer anyhow, that they separated. Grandma's House had a huge willow tree in the yard with a split in the trunk at just the right height to help you start climbing - Grandpa built a little platform somewhat above that for us. With the platform to continue from, I was able to climb high enough in that tree to look down on the roof of their two-story house.
My grandmother was a professional seamstress, and her sewing room off the dining room was one of my favorite places in their house. You couldn't walk barefoot in there - there were pins everywhere! She used to help me sew clothes for my Barbie doll, and I used to watch when her clients came to be fitted for dresses. My mother knit and sewed and everything, too, but I'll bet a lot of my love for fiber crafts came from getting that close a look at someone doing it all the time.
My grandparents obviously had their issues, but who doesn't? Each of them was involved in our lives in the way they could be, and each of them had an influence on who we are today. Some of my treasured possessions are seemingly trivial things that remind me of them; a construction paper valentine that I gave my grandfather as a child, which we found among his possessions after he died; kitchen towels with crocheted tops that my grandmother made, which I used until the fabric literally started falling apart, and which I still keep because, well,
she made them; a stuffed cat that my grandmother sewed; a teddy bear that my grandfather gave me for my collection. I mean, really
silly things, too - I have one large bath towel in the most unusual pea-soup green that used to be my grandmother's. I don't know what I'll ever do if it wears out enough that I can't keep using it.
Somewhere in my heart, though, I know that my grandparents aren't in these trivial things.
