Tomatoes and Squirrels- Memories of the Greatest Generation
I keep thinking of my neighbors Joe and Peg. They were the closest I have ever come to having grandparents that I genuinely remember. There are only fleeting memories of my biological grandparents lodged in the back of my mind. In truth, I remember their deaths more than their lives. I was 5. They passed 5 months apart.
But these neighbors. They lived diagonally behind me from the time I was 5 until I was well into my 20s. They were my real grandparents in terms of bond rather than blood. Many afternoons were spent at their house chatting and laughing. They were long retired and didn’t have the same busy lives that the other adults in my life had. They had time to listen and talk- really talk- to a little kid.
Joe was tall and handsome, in his younger years, gregarious in nature and one of the nicest people I have ever met. He was a gunner in the Army Air Corp during World War II and was at the Battle of Guadalcanal. He told me the funny, zany stories that come with being in the military. For example, Once they were on a cargo plane and they were carrying kegs of stolen beer, liquor and Pineapple Juice, the plane was too heavy to fly and they started losing altitude. The pilot yelled to them that the pineapple juice had to go so they tossed the pineapple juice into the pacific ocean. The Pilot then told them if they still kept losing altitude some of the passengers would have to parachute out of the plane. The alcohol was too precious. A few times he started to tell me darker stories but caught himself in time. I could still see the dark memories flicker in his usually bright eyes. After the War, he came home and became a fireman in his hometown (and mine). He had also a night job of digging graves at the cemetery to make extra money. His son Mike would become my Dad’s best friend. Joe loved to reminisce about the old days when his kids were growing up. One day when my father was a teenager, the water heater in their three family house started smoking. Someone saw the smoke coming out of the attic (the water heater in that old house was in the attic for reasons unknown to me) so my dad went outside to grab the garden hose to bring it to the attic so he could drain the water heater and fix it. Just as he was running back inside with the hose the fire department arrived. Joe was among them. He called to my dad “You know if you want to put the fire out you need it to be hooked up to something!” Years later when I was 12 or 13 my dad bought a new garden hose and Joe called from his deck “Gonna put out a fire with that!?!” My dad called back “Thought I’d bring it up to the attic first!”
Joe loved to eat. We grow tomatoes in our garden every year. We always brought him garden fresh tomatoes every summer, still warmed by the summer sun. Every single time he would react like I brought him a bag of diamonds, he exuded gratitude. All these years, I assumed it was because he really loved tomatoes. But maybe it was something more. Maybe he knew it was all my small childhood hands had to give. And he was grateful
When I went over their house, I would spend 2–3 hours sitting on the couch talking, just talking. I loved talking to them. They talked to me like I was a person, with real feelings, and real dreams and emotions, not a silly child- which is how many of the adults in my life talked to me. I knew I could tell them anything. I told them of my hopes and dreams, things that made me angry and things that made me cry. I told them things I never told my parents or any other adults. And they treated me and my opinions with respect and gravity.
Peg was a spitfire of a woman with a sharp wit and motherly disposition. Peg talked a lot about when she was growing up. She talked about the dancing at the park, swimming in the city park and growing up during The Depression. One day I got a new bike for my birthday and she was amazed at how fancy it looked. “It even has rubber tires!” My 10 year old mind didn’t understand why this was amazing and I told her so. She looked at me dumbfounded at my opulence. She told me about how they couldn’t get rubber or metal during the depression so some of the boys in her neighborhood tried to make bikes out of wood and scrap metal they found but it didn’t work well. I never took my rubber tires and metal bike frame for granted again.
She told me of going to the store with her mother as a child. Most things were rationed. They had to wait in long lines just to get a few pounds of flour, meat, a few eggs and some milk. There was no such thing as picky eaters. You ate what you got and you were grateful for it because there was no other choice other than to go hungry. Butter and sugar were luxuries most couldn’t afford. She savored every dollop of butter and every grain of sugar until the end of her life. She loved simple things. Bright red flowers in a window box. A squirrel on the deck. A phone call from the neighbors.
When Joe was at the end of his life, he asked for me, to say goodbye. That gesture meant more to me than anything in the world. At his funeral their grand-daughter asked Peg if he was still as handsome as he was the day she married him. She told a story about how how he was so handsome that all the girls wanted him and he choose her so they stopped talking to her out of spite. She said “That’s OK I got him; which is all I really wanted anyway.” and was done with all those other girls.
Sometimes even now almost 8 years later, the phone will ring and for a fleeting moment I will think maybe its Joe. Every summer I pick tomatoes, still warmed by the summer sun with reverence and a little sadness that I can’t go bounding up the deck stairs and knock on the back door with a basket of them in hand. I can still hear Joe’s booming voice calling to me from the living room that the door is open and to come on in. Every time I eat a fresh garden tomato I do so with gratitude that I am allowed such fine things in life.