Raspberry Freezer Jam

The taste of raspberries always reminds me of my grandma.

Of spoonfuls of freezer jam in my oatmeal (that she made

from the raspberry bushes in her backyard, and maybe from

some out at camp, too). Reminds me how every few years, if you

cut back the vines, the thorny out of control stuff, then the roots

and everything underneath can flourish and next summer what

comes back will be even healthier. They remind me of how lucky

I am to have gone to my grandparents 50th anniversary, and of how

roses don’t actually make me think of her (even though her name

is Rose), but how Rosebuds do (my grandpa’s name was Bud). Or

how strong someone has to be to carry the weight of a family for

decades, to watch and raise and love kids without questions or

conditions for more than 70 years. Makes me think about how

hard it must have been to look after kids in the 50s, and the 60s,

and the 70s, and the 80s, and the 90s, and the 2000s, and the

2010s, and maybe most of all now in the 2020s when things keep

speeding up and old bodies slow down, whether you want them

to or not. They remind me of building forts in the cedar trees on

the side of the house out of string and boards that we found,

and how she let us spend all day trying to make something that

she knew would never work but instead of crushing dreams

she would just sit on the deck and sip iced tea and let us think

that we were really doing something. Or like how, despite playing

football in high school and going to a football school, she definitely

knows more about football than me and is a better fan than I’ll ever

be and how even though half of her kids like the wrong team, everyone

is always welcome to come over and watch a game and cheer. Really,

I think she knows more about every sport than me, if we were to put it

to the test. They make me think of all of the holidays when the whole

family would make their way through her house at some point, door

never closed and food never running short, always some fried fish

(usually perch), and always those melt-in-your-mouth cream cheese

cookies in the holiday tins (although sometimes you had to rush to

fight off the others to make sure you got a few before they were all eaten).

And all of the other days that we would gather, the whole lot of us, dozens

of cousins and second cousins… all of us dusty and sweaty and bit up

from mosquitos from playing kick the can around camp. They make

me think about how certain things are as sure an argument for

nature over nurture, like how I can’t sit still for long without getting

crabby (I wonder where both my mom and I could have possibly

gotten it from?). Or how for every game, graduation, wedding, or

other occasion she was there, for every grandchild (and great,

and great-great). How there are stories that should be told

about the old days and family members that aren’t around

anymore because they moved away in the 60’s and no one

has talked to them since except for grandma or they died

long before any of us were even born so none of us have had

the chance to know them, and how if we don’t ask sometimes

those stories get left and are forgotten. They make me think

about how you can be a bookworm at any age, and how so

many good years for a family can come from one person.

The taste of raspberries always reminds me of my grandma.