The Rest of It
- Heather Kelly Hohenwarter
- Nov 1, 2018
- 3 min read
Updated: Aug 13, 2023
My grandmother always carried a small transistor radio around with her, and to the day she died, it would be on her bedside table next to a cup of water with a napkin folded up around the edges.
The day she died was a year ago today.
I imagine she would have spent a fortune on batteries for that radio this political cycle, stubbornly refusing to learn how to use ‘that damn iPhone’ for streaming news channels. She loved politics. And as a child, I rolled my eyes in boredom at the staticky AM radio voices droning on about things that didn’t matter to me. When she told me it should matter to me for my future, I tuned her out. I was 15. My future was a party next weekend.
Lost to me then in the hum of her words was, “It matters to me the world you kids will live in.” But now that I’m older, I see myself the reason for the knowledge she was after - the hope things would turn out alright in the end, for us.
At the heart of seeking is the desire to find something to fasten our hearts to.
Today I read Afghani Pilot Major Abdul Rahman Rahmani’s letter to the wife of his fallen American comrade, Major Brent Taylor and Utah mayor, a hero who died fighting for the freedom of another country.
Major Rahmani wrote that Major Taylor “died on our soil but he died for the success of freedom and democracy in both of our countries.” That he taught him to “treat my children as treasured gifts, to be a better father, to be a better husband and to be a better man...I remember him saying, "Family is not something. It is everything."
Major Taylor fastened his heart to the fight for freedom because it mattered to him the world his seven kids would live in.
Politics are a thread through each of our stories. To children - an invisible one, to some - the main color, to most of us - present but not foundational to the fabric of our lives.
It’s the rest of it that makes up the main colors, the complicated patterns, the intricate designs. The first moment a baby wraps his hand around your finger, the high flying of a park swing, the dirty socks strewn about a house that’s filled with varying degrees of laughter, shouts of “where’s my…”, the sounds of a piano song played badly for months - then all at once, masterfully. People piled on couches, laughing, wine glasses tipping.
Road trips and Dramamine. Speedboating and waterskiing. Googling symptoms then weaving together like threads of steel to hold each other up. Sunsets sinking after perfect days. Horrible days that end. Christmas mornings and random Thursdays. Stuffed tackle boxes. Changing zip codes and unpacked family heirlooms. Climbing ladders to pick the highest apple. Flashlight tag, fireflies and wood smoke.
The feel of my grandmother’s hand on my forehead, checking for fever. Rocking all my three babies to sleep, dancing around kitchens. The joy in her voice, now one year free of this world, “Oh Peachy, how wonderful to hear from you!" every time we spoke, even if only after one day.
It seems, in the end, that the ‘rest of it’ is all of it. At the center of everything is who we love and the sounds from the transistor radio are just echoes of voices, not the real thing.
“Family is not something. It is everything.” Family is who we fasten our hearts to.
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