Remember the Corn
How my son helped me remember to remember
My three-year-old son, Graeme, has a specific bedtime routine.
He lies down, fusses with his blankets and stuffed animals, then becomes still while I hum him shortened renditions of a few songs. Most nights it’s the closing credits from My Neighbor Totoro, followed promptly by the theme from Harry Potter. Other nights it’s condensed versions of leitmotifs from The Lord of the Rings. And some nights it’s “Dum Dum.” That particular request is for The Imperial March from Star Wars. I don’t know how, but I’ve managed to turn it into a lullaby.
Once our songs are done, we do Noses. This is a little ritual my wife started with her daughter - my stepdaughter - when she was very young. It’s like a secret handshake. Previously only reserved for mom, Graeme has recently taken to doing Noses with me. He’ll bring his fingers together, press them to his lips, then up to his nose, repeat the actions on my face, and give me a big hug and kiss on the cheek. Finally, after all that, it’s good night.
One thing has changed lately.
As I’m shutting the door, Graeme will sit bolt upright and shout: “Dad! Don’t forget about the corn, okay?!”
I have absolutely no idea what this means.
My wife and I haven’t been able to come up with any reasonable answers. We ate corn-on-the-cob all summer, and recently had some in a cottage pie. Still, we couldn’t think of any instance where Graeme would have needed to issue a corn-themed reminder.
Then Bill Brady died.
Bill and Susan Brady have been friends of my family for decades.
Originally from Massachusetts, Bill and Sue bought property in New Hampshire in the early ‘70s. They spent many summers renovating the old, 1810 farmhouse, and tending their vast acreage. When my mother was young, she, her siblings, and my grandparents, would visit whenever they could.
Billy Brady was my grandfather’s best friend. It was this connection that really drew me to him. My grandfather - Joe, Jr., Roger, etc. - died less than a year before I was born. My dad’s father - Dan - had also died several years prior.
I grew up without a grandfather. Though I couldn’t define it when I was young, I yearned to have that presence in my life. Someone who would tell me stories about the past, and take me fishing, or out to baseball games. I would be yearning still, were it not for Bill Brady.
Bill treated my siblings and I as if we were his own grandchildren. He’d take us out for rides in his 1930 Ford Model A Coupe. He’d let us zoom around his property, first in an old golf cart, then, when we were older and stronger, in a John Deere Gator. He’d take us to Lake Winnipesaukee, where we’d spend long afternoons lounging on his boat.
But my favorite memories are simpler than that.
During college, I’d take a week off every summer and drive up to visit Bill on my own. We’d sit out on his “porch” - the awning between the garage door and the driveway - sip glasses of iced tea or coffee, and talk.
He’d ask how I was doing in school and how my writing was going. He’d inquire after my family and friends. But mostly, he’d talk about my grandfather. He never lost an opportunity to tell me just how special my grandfather was, and how much he would have loved getting to know me and my siblings. I think Bill felt it was his duty to keep my grandfather’s memory alive, especially since I’d never known him.
Bill’s favorite stories to tell were about my grandpa's fanatic obsession with sports.
Once, there was a replay of a Red Sox game Bill and Grandpa had watched the previous week. They were bored and decided to watch the replay. As soon as the first pitch was thrown, Grandpa reacted to every play the same as he had during the original game.
“That was out!” “What kind of a pitch was that!” “Nice going, Barrel Ass!” “These bums don’t deserve to win!”
Grandpa paced up and down the room, sometimes leaving, sometimes returning just to turn off the television and turn it back on again. Bill sat in silent stitches, watching his best friend, who didn’t even realize what he was doing, put on a pitch perfect recreation.
It is my favorite story of my grandfather.
So what exactly does this have to do with my three-year old reminding me about corn?
Well, Susan, Bill’s wonderfully spunky wife, kept a beautiful garden teeming with all manner of colorful vegetables. Susan took care of most of the garden, but Bill was always in charge of the corn.
He loved corn-on-the-cob.
My siblings and I would help pick the ears and fill the bucket of his tractor with the husks. Summer meals saw the table loaded with bowls of steaming corn. Bill would sit at the head of the table, a tall glass of milk by his side, and proceed to eat his weight in corn.
It was the timing of Graeme’s comments that struck me. He started insisting I remember the corn about a week before his third birthday, which is around the same time that Bill took a nasty fall. The fall resulted in a brain bleed. Two weeks later, Bill was gone.
Understand, the connection was mine to make. Graeme doesn’t have the ability to sense when people are dying or when they’re hurt. (Though whether or not I’m raising a small Sith Lord with those lullaby requests is still in question.)
The point is that children say strange, seemingly nonsensical things that, for whatever reason, connect certain dots in mom or dads brain. I know my son, who only met Bill Brady once - and charmed the heck out of him, I may add - has no way of knowing about the corn connection. He was just saying the random sort of thing kids often say.
But I’m not going to view it that way.
This an instance of what I’m calling food for fatherhood. Not because of any literal connection with corn, but because my little son helped me remember to remember. His random reminder - “Don’t forget the Corn, Dad!” - connected to dots to help me better remember the man who, for all intents and purposes, was my grandfather.
I will miss Bill dearly, but this too is part of what it means to be a father. You work through grief and you come out on the other side of it, hopefully, wiser. And once the leaves are raked, the snow comes, and melts, there will be a patch of my yard reserved for corn. And neither I, nor Graeme, will be forgetting it.
