On Sunday, when I boarded my train at Penn Station, mouse medicine seems to have been front and center, as my focus was purely on my destination, which was to see Connie in Princeton. I neglected to notice the names of any other town that we would be passing through on the way.
I found a seat, alone, by a window and as I watched the land of my post India childhood, spring to life around me, with woods and grass and flowering trees and tulips, and a bright spring sky, my feelings carried me into memories where voices and images of people from years past became real and present and then! Whooosh! We pulled up into a station whose sign said ‘Metuchen’.
I gasped. And wanted to jump off the train and run as fast as I could to 36 Highland Avenue to find my family! My father’s family. My Grandpa and Grandma and the gardens and the swings and shelling peas and rose trellises and rhubarb and the dark wood banister and white lace curtains and bowl of licorice and the smell of Grandpa’s pipe and laughter and linen table cloths and a roast in the oven and new organza dresses and sneaking into the pantry and reading in the sun room and more laughter and my sister and and and and and…
My Grandpa had built this house, once upon a time, when he was vice president of Exxon. He had begun working for Standard Oil of New Jersey, Esso, when he was twelve, as janitor, and by being fair and smart, had worked his way up to head of exports. He and my Scottish grandmother had nine children in this house, and then he was forcibly retired for not being willing to sell oil to Germany before World War 2. He devoted the remainder of his life to his family and his gardens and cooking and laughing.
My heritage and its gifts flashed before my eyes in that one brief shining moment in Metuchen, and the bliss and gratitude that it re-ignited is shining in my heart.
Thank you Grandpa and Grandma.
