A Celebration, A Clock and Memories

We sang louder, squeezed our hugs a little tighter and hung on a little longer, as we wished my brother-in-law a Happy Birthday on Saturday. My niece Kathy put together a fabulous luncheon for the family members who could drop in and wish Gene a Happy Birthday. As I have told you before Gene has been diagnosed with dementia and is also fighting the good fight against cancer.

As you can see from the smile on his face he enjoyed being surround by his family and the grand dogs.

I always admired the clock my sister has sitting on her shelf just off of her dining room, it belonged to my grandparents.

My grandparents owned a large piece of property with their house and the rag rug factory sitting adjacent to the house.  After the rug business folded my father renovated the factory into a house, where I lived until I was married. My sister and brother had the pleasure of living next door to our grandparents and two aunts. 

My sister and brother would talk about how wonderful our grandfather was, but they also said he required them to do work that the other cousins weren't asked to do. Picking up the apples that fell from the tree was a task that they did not enjoy.  I never had the delight of meeting my grandparents, my grandmother had passed before I was born, and I was only a few months old when my grandfather left this world.

Sitting on top of a beautiful wooden wall unit in the kitchen sat the clock. My sister tells me that the clock was a wedding gift to our grandparents and that the clock came with them from Poland as they made their way to America. All of the cousins have memories of our grandfather carefully winding the clock, which chimes loudly on the quarter hour, half hour and hour. 

The clock continued to sit on the wooden wall unit chiming loudly and was lovingly wound by my Aunt Stella, that had continued to live in the family homestead well into her eighties.

My sister was given the clock and it has been in her house ever since. While the clock is in working condition my sister does not wind it because of the extremely loud chiming.

While making new memories during the birthday celebration, the clock brought back memories of old for my sister and myself, and gave us the opportunity to again share our clock memories with our children, and my grandchildren. Perhaps whoever receives the clock will continue to pass on these memories of the clock.