I was a young mother of two boys, 20 years old, when my cousin Tommy was killed in Vietnam. The Marines came to tell Aunt Margie her middle son wouldn’t be coming home, or at least when he did it would be in a box, his body frozen for the two week trip home.
We were a close family, cousins as close as siblings, aunts and uncles parents to us all. We all lived in the same area and not a week went by that I didn’t see my grandparents and parents and usually an aunt or uncle or two. Calls were made and one by one, or two by two, or in small groups, we all made our way to Aunt Margie and Uncle Bob’s house. They lived about two blocks from my parents.
Everyone was stunned and pretty quiet. It wasn’t that we were shocked something like this could happen. Our family had experienced death before, and more often than most people I knew. An uncle killed in France in WWII. An uncle killed in Korea. Various other deaths unrelated to military service; a baby brother who didn’t make it past 3 days, an aunt who died at 13 years of age. A family friend shot by his girlfriend. As far as military service, we knew full well the cost of going to fight America’s wars. So we lived with the thought Tommy might never make it home.
As we all arrived, someone every few minutes, at Aunt Margie’s, hugs were given but I don’t remember that anyone really told her or Uncle Bob they were sorry for their loss. It was a communal loss, each member loved by everyone. It’s that way in close families. He belonged to all of us, a member of our tribe as we say today. Family as we said back then.
I settled on the sofa and watched Aunt Margie iron clothes. She wasn’t crying or screaming, as I’m sure she felt like doing. She just quietly ironed. Jeans, shirts, pants, anything she could find to iron. Someone told her not to worry with that, just to come sit down. But she said she couldn’t. She had to stay busy. She said it quietly as was her way. She was a pretty, quiet woman and she’d had a hard life. Of all the women in our family, she was the one who seemed to me the most fashionable with an understated, classic style. Her thick black hair cut in a short bob at times and piled on her head at other times. She wasn’t too big or too small, just the right size. She had a lovely soft laugh and an easy smile. Rare in my family of loud, boisterous people.
Watching her calmly iron clothes as her son lay dead on the other side of the world broke my heart. And it still does. I’ve seen people scream and cry and fall on the floor upon hearing bad news, of facing the loss of a loved one. But I’ve never seen anything more heartbreaking then Aunt Margie quietly ironing clothes as the family who loved her and who loved Tommy sat all around her. I’ve seen that same strength and calmness in others of my family, facing the loss of stillborn babies, of husbands, of children, of parents. And each time I think back to Aunt Margie and her quiet grace. We all learned from her and from others like my own parents, and it’s passed on to the generations that didn’t even know her.
I rarely iron anymore. I choose to wear clothes that don’t need ironing and I’m not a fussy dresser. I’m retired so I have a boring wardrobe. Once, years ago now, when I was going through a life changing period in my life, I faced depression and despair. My best friend, who was worried about me, made me an appointment with her therapist. It was a week later before I could see her. In that time I managed to shake it off and I was much better. Because I had the examples of plenty of strong women in my family. When I talked to the therapist I jokingly told her the terrible thing about my being so down was that all my clothes were permanent press, as we called them back then, and I didn’t have anything to iron. I said if I’d had some clothes to iron, as was our family tradition in times of great stress, I’d be ok. We had a nice talk and life went on and so did I.
I ironed a few clothes today. Not mine. I own two shirts that need ironing. I seldom wear them, and when I do I take them to the cleaners 45 miles away in Durango. Today I was helping out a loved one who has no time to iron. And as I do every time I run the hot iron over the fabric, smoothing out the wrinkles, Aunt Margie comes to mind. She’s there in her sleeveless button shirt and tan “pedal-pushers”, as we called cropped pants back in 1970. Ironing her family’s clothes, looking up every so often to ask if any of us need anything.
