My Mom reaches her arm through the opened door of the cupboard returning with a round black object in her hand, turns toward me and asks me, “do you want this?”
I reach for the quietly ticking sphere and feel a sensory memory flooding my brain.
“Although it’s been decades”
Since I last saw my Grandfathers pocket watch, it carries inside of it a cache of wonderful memories. Memories of fragrant, spicy scented chewing tobacco, his snuff tin living in the chest pocket of his cotton plaid shirt. Of it perched in the palm of his opened hand as he stood outside pondering life. Waxed cardboard, short, stubby, old fashioned writing on it’s side. The shiny tin lid clattering on the kitchen table as he opened it after his dinner.
Whiskers prickling my face as he hugged us hello while we stretched, emerging from our truck and camper, a day long drive through mountains, across provinces.
Tears welling in his aged face the last time I was to see him alive. Cancer from the chewing tobacco he consumed every day taking it’s final toll.
His little Datsun truck, seated up to two adults and a fortunate child, the trip to town a treat. Small tires bumping down narrow, dusty, country roads. Closely lined with popular trees that threw cotton at us in the spring, russet leaves in the chilly fall days, drifting like confetti at a big city wedding.
His watch, small, round, black, self winding, a magnet sticking it to the dusty dashboard of the truck. Ticking off the lengthy minutes for our trips to the little town.
“The drive felt like hours.”
Gravel side roads leading to highways finally meeting up with flat unending Alberta pavement. Straight lines unfamiliar to our coastal eyes.
My last visit, seeing the farm through the eyes of a adult, those long driving minutes seemed so short. The outskirts of their small town creeping closer. Familiar landmarks, and buildings that had loomed so large in my memory, dilapidated, small.
Now as I stood in my parents home, holding my Grandfather’s pocket watch,
“I was filled with fond memories.”
“Yes Mom, I would love to have this,” I told her. “It means a lot to me.”
My Grandfather’s watch is tucked into the family treasures on my shelf. I will stop when I pass by, pick it up and give it a quick shake. Holding it up to my ear to hear it ticking off it’s memories as the self winder starts it up once again.
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