When I was born I briefly lived in an apartment in Worcester with my parents and twin brother Jay. We then moved to another apartment for a short while. I was too young to remember either of these places. However, I remember the 3rd place where I lived. It was on Queen Street in Worcester in my grandfathers house. We lived on the 2nd floor of a triple decker, a house that I have previously wrote about on this blog. As it was right across from City Hospital, I associate it with the sound of ambulances and death, as it is also the house where my grandfather died while shoveling snow on his back deck after the blizzard of 78. We had moved out of there when I was five, but the house has always remained in my mind and I think about it often. While I have many memories of going to visit my grandparents there after we had moved out, I have very few memories of actually living there. One of those memories came to the surface just recently after being dormant for a number of years.
A few weeks ago my son and I took a two week road trip across the United States, and one of our stops happened to be the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library in Independence Missouri. I had always been fascinated with Truman. He was the last President to not finish college, and seemed to have ascended to the nations highest political post very quickly and against all the odds. If I were to guess, Truman himself probably didn't quite understand how he managed to become President of the United States. My son and I also went on a tour of Truman's home on Delaware street. It was a humble place for an ex-president to live. The floor in the kitchen was linoleum, and the docent explained that Truman had used thumbtacks to hold the linoleum down in spots that had ripped. These tack were still plainly visible. Truman's library was also a humble affair. A small room with a chair and some book cases. It was about the same size as my library and I couldn't help but notice that some of the books looked familiar. While I was here I thought back to my childhood on Queen Street.
It was late December of 1972. I was four years old. A few days earlier my father had given my brother and I small clear plastic cups with soil in them in which we planted a seed. we were entranced by the small green sprouts that had suddenly appeared like magic. The television was on. It was an old black and white affair, a floor model that sat near a window in the living room. On the screen I recall seeing a flag draped coffin being carried by pallbearers. It seemed to be a solemn and sad procession and as a four year old I was not sure what it meant. I only knew that it was the end of something. I guess my instinct told me that. I must have asked someone what it was, and someone must have explained to me that it was the funeral of Harry Truman. It was a few days later when I looked at the plastic cups and noticed that one of the green sprouts had turned brown while the other was thriving. Death was a finality to this existence, and I guess it occurred to me that week back in 1972 that death was real. Harry Truman and my seedling had taught me this. However, I also perceived that life was quite arbitrary and indiscriminate. Why had one of the seedlings died while the other blossomed into a fine looking flower?
My son and I walked outside into the garden at the Truman Library. We were the only ones out there. As I stood over the burial plot of Truman and his wife Bess I couldn't help but think of that brown withered seedling from so long ago...but at the same time remembered the flower that had bloomed full of life.
