Inheritance

There is no good time to die. There is seemingly always something to hang on for: Christmases and New Years, family vacations and weddings, recitals and graduations, the birth of a child. These life events string together like a strand of pearls and as time accumulates, it is only human nature to want to thread just one more. If we’re lucky, we’ll end with a long rope indeed.

Pat Gilson could wrap herself, her daughter, two neighbors and then some with the length of life she lived. The third born in a family of seven, she crammed her young life inside a small home in Cloquet, Minnesota, attempting to eke out some peace amongst the chaos. Here she would get her training as a matriarch being tasked with domestic chores, child care for younger siblings, and learning how to wield her female influence.

When she was not much more than a child herself, she would meet her husband, Brian, and cement her fate in our world of family. A wisp of a girl, at the age of 17 she had her first child, Sandy, and declared herself done at 19 after the life-threatening birth of their son, Ted.

Pat was the weight of her family, the center of gravity in which all those who knew her got caught in her pull. She was loud and gregarious. She spoke her mind. Often. She bossed her husband around in crisp orders and grumpy overtones while spending hours making his favorite meals and ironing neat creases down the middle of his jeans. She wasn’t exactly a party girl, but brought the party with her wherever she went, laughing in raspy bursts over cups of coffee or Manhattans all the same, a slender ribbon of smoke perpetually rising from her cigarette. Her curly hair was so think and glossy dark she was accused of coloring it most of her life, though she never did.

While her husband worked long, hard hours in the papermill, Pat ran the household, became a confidante and partner to her mother, and worked outside the home in the ruckus of the Middle School lunchroom. For a long time, she and Brian would toil over the domestic demands of a second property, trading their bits of leisure to give their children sunsets and cool swims on Prairie Lake.

She would become a grandmother for the first time to an exotic looking child from half way around the world, who would later dub her Hattie. I was the first of four grandchildren, and in this role, she excelled. She doted and spoiled, defended and praised, and gave unconditional love to us all in ways I dare say she ever did with her own children, but I suppose is the privilege of every grandparent to do.

As time let out its thread, Pat continued to be the center of gravity to her family, we flocked around her in larger numbers now, great-grandchildren clamoring for space at her side too. In her circle of confidantes and partners she would include her daughter who became a lifelong ally and friend. Pat was a caregiver, devoting many years to her mother and mother-in-law until their deaths, all the while hosting Holiday meals, attending birthday parties, living life out loud in the sharp and charming mix of hard edged complaints and generous laughter that was Pat.

In the end, Pat would be given the long and difficult goodbye of dementia. At first it came slowly, quietly chipping away here and there. But eventually it would come to claim her whole. As her mental and physical state changed, she once again became the wisp of a girl in her youth, mingled with the weariness and fragility of long years. We watched and waited as she slowly faded, her room constantly filled with the chatter and quiet tears of family.

I can no more write about Pat’s life on a piece of paper than I could contain our galaxy in the palm of my hand. We are all constellations of possibility and unknowns.

What I can write about is the immense gratitude I have that she was in my life and the gifts that she leaves me with. Because of her, I wear the jewels that were forged in the fires of her life. I imagine her strand is not made of the well-shaped milky hue of cultured pearls, but rather the irregular formed and iridescent shimmer of the fresh water variety; a beauty that is created with unexpected variables and harsh seasons, swirling in the deep currents of untamed waters.

Leaving me and those left behind, adorned in her wild gleam.