Was raised in Jamaica, New York by German immigrant parents. They were very proud of their heritage, but did not allow any German to be spoken in their home. “You’re in America, speak English.” (I’m not saying it’s right, I’m saying it was that way in their home.) When her father passed away, a number of benefactors, from his union I believe, helped her mother purchase a small store to support the family.
At the young age of 6, she remembers roller-skating down to the wholesaler, to pick up a case of eggs and a 5 pound crock of butter, by herself.
She had a brother who died young, I think maybe from Polio. But not before he taught her how to catch a baseball with her bare hands. She had to, her mother refused to buy her a glove, because girls did not play baseball.
She lost her mother very early, too. By the age of 12, she was living in her older sister’s home. Her losses did not stunt her academically. She graduated from school early, and went to work.
It was on the way to work one day, on the bus, that she met the man who would someday be her husband. She was all of 14 years old. She used to carry a hat pin in her hand on that bus, in case anyone got ‘fresh’ with her. I wonder if she had it with her that day, and if she had any cause to use it on him.
By the time she was 16, she was working in a law office, the lawyer she worked for thought she was very bright. It was the last year a person could take the bar and practice law without going to law school. He offered to tutor her, so she could take and pass the bar. She declined.
She married Edward Syren, and they had some great times. Camping on Long Island, Eddie’s Indian motorcycle, picnics in their old model T, going up to ‘the farm’, and lots of friends and clubs. They hunkered down and waited to have children until after the depression. Then they had Donald. They built a house for themselves in Pennsylvania. Rumor has it, Grandma dug the basement mostly by herself, while Eddie was at work and she was pregnant.
She lost her husband young. I never got to meet him. I asked her years later, why she never went out with anyone else. I was young and full of romantic notions, and she’d just run across a box containing every card, note, and letter he’d ever sent her. She wouldn’t let me open it. She wouldn’t talk about them. So I asked her the other question. And she said, “I had my love, my husband, what else is there?”
I remember her having neat stuff at her house, when I was a little girl. Ginger ale, cantaloupe ripening on the porch. A suet feeder for the birds (or the deer?) and woods in her backyard. I remember watching the Muppet Show in her living room. I remember tasting beer at her house.
When I got to spend more time with her, during college, I remember her talking to me like an adult. We talked about women’s roles in the world, how they change, how they don’t. We talked about finding love, finding happiness, having children, raising children. Raising children, when she was distant enough from her own experience to romanticize it and my experience was distant enough in the future for me to do the same.
She was really great to talk to. Maybe not so much the last few years. But I still relish the talking we did do, back in the day.
My Grandma Syren passed away this morning. She was 96. She was an amazing woman. I love her and I sure am going to miss her.
Sep
19