By Nancy Patrick

I do not spend the entire month of December watching Christmas movies, but I do enjoy an occasional sit-down with a classic holiday story. One of those is Home Alone 2 (1992), the successful sequel to the hilarious Home Alone (1990).

As implied by the titles, the movies tell the hugely exaggerated stories of a little boy accidentally separated from his large family as they prepare to vacation together during the Christmas season.

As I watched the sequel, something Kevin, the mischievous little star of the show, said to a homeless woman he had encountered in Central Park in New York City, touched my heart. In homelessness, she feared most that those she loved would forget her. Kevin promised her that he would “never forget to remember her.” 

That promise reminded me of what I told someone several years ago after having lost multiple family members in a very short time. I thought about loved ones in my past that I shared with a few family members. In my logic, those people will live until the last one who remembers them joins them in death.

I remember my paternal grandparents, Ray and Effie Smith. What a pair they were! Married at ages nineteen and fifteen, these two Arkansas kids produced five children: Raymond (1926), Henry (1928), Velma (1930), Isabel (1932), and Willa Jean (1934). As adults, all five of their kids left Arkansas, but all the families remained close emotionally and spent holidays and vacations together. 

I remember several things about my Smith grands. They owned a chicken farm in Blevins, Arkansas, where they taught the grandkids how to gather eggs from the henhouses. They slaughtered their own hogs and had pork year-round. They both worked extremely hard with my grandfather taking care of most of the outdoor work while my grandmother cooked and cooked and cooked.

I know they couldn’t have been well-off, but their house included three bedrooms, a dining room, and a bathroom. Mind you, their home had no frills to accompany the necessities.

I remember that every night when my granddad went to bed, he wanted the grandchildren to jump up on the bed with him so he could give us scratchy kisses. My grandmother, on the other hand, loved to matchmake and tell questionable tales to the grandkids.

I remember my maternal grandmother whose house sat in the middle of a field that the Army had used to test weapons during WW II. Addie Irene Carr, born in 1901, lived a difficult life. Carl Carr, her husband and my grandfather, was an abusive alcoholic which contributed to the family’s poverty. Their marriage produced five daughters, the third of whom was my mother, Norma Jean.

Carl died at the age of fifty-two, the result of a ruptured stomach ulcer. At that time, he had two grandsons and two infant granddaughters. He had three more granddaughters after his death.

Addie never remarried and barely eked a living out of a job at a laundry in Hope, Arkansas. In her later years, she lived on government benefits but remained a very proud and independent woman.

In contrast to my other grandparents, Mamaw Carr lived in a small house with a country kitchen, a living room, and two bedrooms. She had no bathroom and no hot water. She did have a water faucet that provided cold water from a well.

Nancy Patrick’s mother crocheted “Smith” for placement between two photos of Nancy’s parents.

When we visited her, my mother bathed my sister and me together in an aluminum tub in the kitchen, near the stove.  She had to heat the cold well water on the stove so we had some warm water for our bath.

The “facilities” included an outhouse down a path from the house. To say my sister and I did not enjoy going to the bathroom understates our feelings. I feared snakes might come up from the toilet seats or a panther would come out of the woods and attack us.

Mamaw Carr had a hard life but deeply loved her family. My mother was her only daughter to leave Arkansas, which meant that my sister and I were her only two grandchildren she did not get to see regularly. At the end of each of our visits as we hugged and said “good-bye,” my grandmother and my mother could hardly let go of each other. I remember my mom crying for some time as we began our journey back to Abilene.

I also remember my mother, Norma Jean Carr and my daddy, Henry Loyce Smith. Both born in 1928, they married in 1947 after having known each other six weeks.

A more unlikely pair would be hard to find. My parents differed as night and day, but their love sustained a sixty-five-year marriage. My parents provided a home and all the necessities my sister and I needed.

In spite of many difficult issues with my mother’s mental health, I always knew she and my dad loved us. They made some very serious mistakes as parents, some of which negatively affected their daughters’ lives. 

In my parents’ declining years, I became closer to them than I had ever before. They became vulnerable and frightened. They depended on me and trusted me with the most intimate details of their lives.

Unconditional love overcomes many grievances. I promised my parents the same thing Kevin promised the homeless woman in Central Park. I would “never forget to remember” them. They live every day in my life. My mom, a talented crocheter, made the “Smith” between the two photos of my parents that I look at it each night as I prepare for bed and remember the lives they shared with me.

Nancy Patrick is a retired teacher who lives in Abilene and enjoys writing