In Times of Pandemic: Remember Us

My grandmother Evelyn contracted polio at a young age. She survived it to then undergo a new cutting edge ligament corrective surgery. It was new and experimental and my uncle says she was the second patient to have this specific surgery. The surgery was mostly successful, but in order to walk and get around, she had to wear a leg brace the rest of her life. She was back to climbing trees mere weeks after her extensive operation, much to her mother’s dismay I am told. Throughout her life, rather than resent the extra appendage, she heaped praises upon it, talking to it, calling it ‘her miracle brace.’  She went on to become a wife, mother, nurse, square-dancer, and grandmother.

My earliest memories of her are inseparable with the contagious cackle that was her laugh, boisterous and mischievous, it filled up the room and made onlookers want in on the joke. She had leprechaun-etched eyes, warm at the center and wild around the edges. She always had Siamese cats throughout her life, devotedly flanking her sides like Freyja’s very own feline familiars. She loved music. And dancing. She was always dancing with my grandpa. They would go square-dancing several times a week and dance their hearts out. Grandma would even get awards for her dancing; she was so rapturous to watch. She was so alive in those moments no one even noticed the leg brace or the slight favor in her gait. I was convinced she was part deity. I still am. She’s been coming to me in my dreams lately, so much, so often. Most times she is joyous, crow’s feet scrunching in tandem with raucous laughter. And then this. 

There’s a wide expanse of meadow stretched out in front of us. With tiny yellow flowers peppered in amongst tall green grass. It takes up all the space as my grandma and I sit on a bench and look out over it. When I first saw the vision of her here, she was dancing, of course. Now she sits down beside me. I bring to her my heart and my worry for humanity and my communities during these times of pandemic. I look down and her leg brace is laid out in the grass in front of us. I ask what we need to know, to do, in these times. She says ‘This.’ Remember us. Remember how we were in our time of pandemic. Remember how I was. Remember how I survived. Remember how some of us didn’t. Remember how those times made us into who we became. Remember how I danced, not in spite of what happened to me, but because of what happened to me. The fire it gave me for life. Reflect on what those before you went through. Reflect on how we persevered. Grieve for those who were not able to.  Remember us. Remember you’re made up of people who had to learn how to do this. You carry that remembering in you now. To remember how to carry this well, remember us. Then she smiles again and laughs, all cackles, and deliciously creased crow’s feet. And we dance.