The other grandmother

Each time he brought up this time in his life, I gently reminded him that it was a long time ago. That Sophie, an immigrant from Poland, loved him and surely didn’t do it to hurt him.

“You’re probably right, Jen,” he would say, but I didn’t know if he meant it.

When my dad was still alive, I turned to Google, in an effort to try to spare him the hurt my prying questions might provoke. And now, years later, I have found even more info on Ancestry.

Thanks to the 1940 census, I now know that Dad’s mother was just 17 years old when she bore her first child. I have tried and failed to imagine what that was like for her, particularly with a husband nine years her senior. While Polish like her, Joseph was born in the States and had a very un-Polish sounding name (alternately Keene, Keen and Kin), a mystery that I still haven’t unraveled. I used to joke that we had an Ellis Island name, but I have since learned that was a myth.

My father was Sophie’s last child, born when his older brothers were thirteen and nine years old and his sister was eleven. He was unplanned. Dad’s father was not around much during his childhood and I know that money was tight. 

But two things keep this story from being too sad to bear.

First, there is the fact that I had a wonderful dad. I imagine that Sophie had something to do with that.

Then there is this: Sophie was a painter. Somehow, some way, in a life that was sometimes cruel, Sophie became an artist. One proud enough of her work to sign every last painting with her name. Several hang in my childhood home, and two more in my Brooklyn apartment.

My grandmother found beauty, as well as the time and means to share it. I’m glad, Babcia. Thank you.