The Space Between Two Lights

I grew up on Pickerel Lake, which is shaped somewhat like a peanut, only with three lobes instead of two.  (So, like a mutant peanut.)  Across the lake from my parents' house is my grandparents' house.  They bought the lot sometime in the '50s, and had a camper on it for several years before building a cabin in 1960.  They expanded it into a small house and retired there in 1978, the year I was born.

When Leslie and I were pretty young, my grandparents had one of those really big yard lights put in--you know the type.  A huge floodlight that illuminated the garage, driveway, and backyard.  (As an aside, if you live in the city, the front yard is between the house and the street.  But, if you live at the lake, the opposite is true--the front yard is between the house and the lake.)  Anyway--it was a big light.  Not many people had them at that point, especially in the winter when most of the summer residents went somewhere much warmer, and only a handful of us were left to enjoy the solitude of our mutant peanut.  The first night they turned the light on, my dad took my sister and I to the window and pointed it out to us.  He said that their light was a little different in color from most, so that even if other people eventually installed lights of their own, we would still always know which light was theirs.

My grandfather, Joe Sedivy, died last week at the age of 97.  He had lived at the lake with my grandmother until a few years ago when he transitioned through three nursing homes and eventually became a resident of the Veteran's Home in Fergus Falls, MN.  After my grandmother moved into an assisted living apartment, it was decided that their lake home should be sold.  It is scheduled to close next week, on February 1st.

Tomorrow, my grandpa will be remembered during a service at his tiny country church, and buried in the equally tiny cemetery across the road.  Tonight was my chance to remember him in my own way.

It is about 16 F here, which feels like a heat wave compared to the last few weeks.  Overcast.  No stars.  No moon.  At 9:30, Jon and I clicked on our skis, I clicked on my headlamp, and we headed to the lake with Jay and Mac.  I picked out my grandparents yard light, and I went for it.

Not far into our trip, Jon called out that he was turning back.  The lake can be an abysmal expanse, and he couldn't stay on top of the snow.  He beats me touring every time because of my fat backcountry skis, but I can outdo him off the trail by floating on the drifts.  He went back, the dogs and I went forward.  I clicked off my headlamp.  When you're not the leader, you no longer need to broadcast your position.

We went and went.  The dogs were joyful shadows running beside me, away from me, towards me, in circles.  The memories flowed.  The memories of a childhood I had wanted so desperately to outgrow.  The memories of my grandpa eating breakfast in his robe, drinking water with both hands on his glass after he acquired a mild case of Parkinson's, the day he helped me figure out how to put my shoes on the correct feet when he decided I was old enough to start tying them.  The joy in his eyes the day he told me he was too old for another dog, but I gave him Max (not to be confused with Mac) anyway.

Joseph E. and Constance B. (Stanek) Sedivy,
Julia, Joe (my grandpa,) and Mary

As you ski closer, the light disappears behind the trees.  Yet I did not overshoot to the north or to the south, but arrived right at their house.  Up the bank we went.  Across the dock (the snow is deep this year.)  Carefully sideslipped to the southwest corner window.  That was my target, I didn't know it when we left, but I knew when I got there.  I rested my head on that window, the window that for so many years overlooked my grandfather's desk, where he still meticulously recorded the weather every day along with their personal finances.  The window above the couch he napped on every afternoon.  The window that invited the most sun.  After a cold ski, my always elusive tears burned hotter than I knew they could.

So many people never know their grandparents, never have them for 32+ years.  Is it selfish to mourn the loss of a man who lived as long, as full, as fortunate a life?  I don't know.  Maybe.  I haven't decided yet.  I don't need to decide today.

Virgos left alone can easily slip into a little place I like to call "reflective oblivion."  This is common knowledge.  Especially on a cold, dark night.  Jay gently bumped my hand, reminding me of the time.  Mac was sitting on the end of the dock, teetering precariously in Mac fashion.  My ski caught under the siding.  Is the house asking me to stay?  Don't be ridiculous.  In a matter of days the house will belong to someone else, to some other family.  It will become their legacy, to be handed down to their children and grandchildren.  Loose the ski.  Down the bank we went, towards the only light blazing on the north shore, the light of my parents' home.

Ski, ski, ski.  Thinking about childhood, years gone by, how absurdly cold it has been the past couple weeks, did I pack the right shoes for tomorrow?  Ski, ski, ski.  I am sliding into memories now, sliding quickly.  My writing is sliding out of tenses.  The dogs are running with purpose.  Where are they going?  Dogs running faster and becoming shadowy shapes, I am no longer able to discern which is Jay and which is Mac.  Dogs running towards a little pinprick of light, so small that I am not sure it is really there.  Squinting.  Is it a fisherman?  Shadow dogs jumping.  It's Jon!  He has come back with my mom's sad little headlamp, desperately in need of new batteries.  Although I will probably never tell him, I have not been so surprised, or so grateful, to see him as in that moment.

Home again, home again.  I have lived many places, and may live many more...but the space between these two lights will always be my home.