The Box

Every child should grow up in a house that shelters a place of mystery, a place of wonder, a place of dreams. Upstairs, in the house on the hill, was such a place. It was filled with treasures, an enchanting place. I remember a library table cluttered with confiscated cardboard and paper from packaging; worn out books and catalogs and stubby pencils. Almost always the bed would be piled with clean clothes that needed to be ironed. There were boxes of old clothes, pictures, abandoned projects and broken things. Clothes lines were strung the length of the long room, perfect for hanging clothes on a rainy day or for hanging a sheet to enclose a play house.

There was a trunk, a very no nonsense trunk with straps and a closure that locked. The absence of a key and the inability to lock it did not diminish the importance this lock brought to the trunk. Mama told us to stay out of it, giving it all the more mystery and importance. Among boxes of letters, cards and old Bibles, special hankies, unfinished quilts, Grandma’s shawl and braided strings of hair was a small closed box. It was almost sacred.

I can’t remember when we learned of its contents. Seems we always knew. It was Little Glen’s clothes and shoes. Glen died when he was thirteen months old. Mama never talked about him. I guess it hurt too much. We honored her wishes and didn’t open the box until after her death. Inside was a little jumper, a pair of leather homemade shoes and a short memory of Martin Glen written in my mother’s handwriting.

We read Mama’s letter to her baby and wept over her pain and loss. Bobbie and I wept for an older brother unknown to us. The other siblings, wept for their baby brother. We carefully placed the aging articles back into the box and dear sweet Marie, Horace’s wife, picked it up, held it to her breast and said, “This was important to Mammie. She kept it all these years. I will keep it now.” And she took it home with her.

Glen slipped away one evening, quite unexpectedly, into the arms of his Heavenly Father. He died of dysentery, a deadly disease in that day for babies and young children. Home remedies were ineffective and the country doctor often hard to find. The disease was swift and merciless.

He was buried beside our Grandma and Grandpa McCoy in a beautiful cemetery surrounding a small white church in Elbridge Tennessee. The following spring, Mama sent the older children to set out a wagon load of primrose on the small grave.

Life went on. Mama never forgot her baby and life for her was never quite the same. I didn’t know her before her heart was so bruised. I came along six years later, a small, sick, premature baby girl. Mama risked her life to save mine, insisting that Doctor Cunningham make sure the baby was stable before he cared for her.

Many of us have boxed up hurt, disappointments, grief and pain tied neatly, and isolated from what we feel is the real world. Sometimes the pain or longing is too great to share. We do not want anyone to open the box. We fear we may betray ourselves, belittle ourselves, or reveal who we really are. But, a heart revealed endures you even more to those who love you. And your pain is of no consequence to those who do not know you. As for those who would judge you, their judgment will be scrutinized by the Great Judge on that day when all things will be revealed. All “boxes” will be opened and God will wipe away all tears. God bless you all.