Raspberry Sunrise
Back in the day, whenever my cousins and I would have sleepovers at grandma’s house, she would wake us up at 5-6 am to watch a sunrise. Just cause! To watch sunrise. ‘But I’m sleepy!’ ‘You can go back to sleep right after! You can almost see the top slice – see the orange crescent? Look, It’s so beautiful!’
She wanted to make sure we grew up to become the kind of people who would pause to marvel at the world’s beauty, to partake and gulp it down hungrily.
Cause there is no such thing as an ugly sunrise…
I once asked my dad – a proud atheist – to take me to grandma’s grave. He was making fun of me the whole ride there. At the cemetery, I noticed a home-carved wooden bench.
My atheist, nothing-is-sacred father put it there. Huh… I thought as a staunch atheist, he wouldn’t care. After all, dad always said it was stupid. Yet there he was, crafting a bench so others could sit down when remembering his mother…
What’s your favorite memory of grandma, dad?
‘…I don’t know…I guess… we were at the country house, she comes inside, face covered in red juice, red clumps on the cheeks: she was picking raspberries. I tell her, “Mom your face is messy red!”. She replies laughing, “yeah but who cares? It’s so delicious!”.
