Remember the Turtle

Carefully I move the framed photos and cards off my dresser. Dust flies everywhere - I hadn't touched these items in awhile, admittedly - as I make space for a large crystal lamp. As I lift the heavy object up onto my dresser, the hanging crystals gently clink together and create music. Music to my ears.

Now that the lamp is situated, I can return the cards and photos to their places. As I dust each item and put it back, one of them catches my eye. It's a beautiful mahogany music box SHE left me. There's a layer of dust on the lid - a twinge of guilt hits me - she wouldn't like to see it sitting unused on a shelf.

I clean the dust off and feel nostalgic. It's been three years - but still, I miss her. As I open the lid, memories flood back. She used to say "Oh dear" after laughing at something. Sometimes I got to ride in the car next to her, in between the driver's seat and the passenger's seat. She was always a smart dresser. She loved her husband. She once told my sister her shoes were "sexy."

It's nearly midnight and I don't want to disturb the people on the other side of the wall, but I really want to see if the music box still plays. I turn it over to find the wind-up... and another memory hits me like a ton of bricks.

We visited their apartment often for an afternoon of swimming in the pool, watching golf on TV, and playing Norwegian poker. At some point during every visit, normally when Grandpa fell asleep in his chair, I would end up in their bedroom gazing down at a tiny turtle statuette on their side table.

I loved that trinket. If you could wind it up, the turtle would move, but my fingers were too little and weak to do it. I would bring her into their room and point at the turtle, begging her to wind it for me, which she almost always did. One day I remember she wound it so many times, a small dent appeared in her thumb.

Grandma was a woman of faith. She loved her family, went to church faithfully, and was a wonderful companion to her husband. I think of Titus 2 when I think of her.

Speak the things which are proper for sound doctrine... that the older women be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things. (v. 1-3)

 My grandmother to a tee. She taught that family was important, that fellowship with believers was crucial, that it was good to laugh.

I wind the music box and listen to the melody of a Schubert piece fill my bedroom. I weep. I tell myself I'll see her again soon.

Beauty comes in all shapes and sizes - and for me, for nineteen years, it came in the form of a tiny white-haired woman named Marian.

- Grace Marita