The Medal
The truth was Margaret loved her Grandfather Conway very much. He lived
with Grandma Conway in a large blue-gray Victorian house on Junction Blvd in
Jackson Heights. The house was the only one on that side of the street and
it sat next to a big open space called "The Lots." The Lots wasn't actually
empty: here and there was an old tire, or an overturned basket from the A&P a
block away. It was a place where people didn't mind dumping their refuse: a
stained, smelly old mattress or packs of string-tied newspapers. Weeds grew
throughout, but there were no trees. So it appeared to be an empty expanse
of space. A path had been worn diagonally across it because people walking
from 34th Avenue over to Blessed Incarnation Church on 35th Avenue and 94th
Street would take the shortest route. It was this path Margaret usually took
to school every morning.
It was a time when first or second graders could walk to school alone and
no parent gave a moment's thought to it. No parents gathered at the school
at 3 o'clock to pick up their children in cars. So in that respect I guess
it was a simpler time, a certainly less worrisome time.
Margaret never caught a glimpse of her grandfather when she passed his
house on her way to school; she saw him only on weekends when her parents
would take her to visit. Today Margaret never thinks of him that he isn't
sitting in his easy chair in the very dark living room of the blue-gray
Victorian house. The living room was always dark even in the middle of the
day. If you ask Margaret now why that was so, she can't tell you because she
can't remember. Were there heavy drapes? (she doesn't think there were), or
blinds? Maybe the windows were too small, or, as was probably the case, the
northeastern exposure allowed very little sun to penetrate.
Margaret will never forget, though, the dark and lovely roll-top mahogany
desk next to her grandfather's chair. She had a great curiosity about it and
longed to open all the little drawers, but there was a rule about not
touching it. And Margaret was at a point in her life when she was very
obedient.
So her grandfather was sitting in his easy chair when she and her parents
arrived. She wasn't ever afraid of him although she saw him infrequently.
He would hold out his hand to her and when she approached he would bark just
like a dog:
"Bow! Bow-wow-wow!"
And Margaret would laugh. He had always done this, so it wasn't
frightening as you might think it would be. Margaret would laugh because it
was the funniest thing any of her grandparents said or did. Actually none of
her other grandparents ever said or did anything that was funny at all.
Grandfather Conway was in his early 60s but he appeared old to Margaret.
He had gray, thinning hair, sallow skin and a bulbous nose he called the
"Conway nose" which he was damn proud of. He didn't notice Margaret's nose
was very much like his own so he never teased her about it the way he had her
mother. He was always dressed in a dark suit with a vest and a faux gold
watch fob (Margaret thought it was real gold) draped from one pocket of the
vest to the other. He had been a chauffeur for a very rich family and when
they retired him they gave him a pension and the Victorian house in which he
and his wife now lived.
He was a Protestant from the north of Ireland and, apparently, this was a
problem. Margaret knew there was something wrong because Grandfather Conway
never came to church with the rest of the family. His church was on 98th
Street, around the corner from where Margaret lived in a two-family yellow
frame house with her parents. He always went to his church alone. Once or
twice Margaret had gone around the block to stand in front of his church.
She was curious, but she knew she wasn't allowed to go in because that would
be a sin. But she liked the church from the outside. It was so much smaller
than the ostentatious Blessed Incarnation which took up a whole block in all
directions including, in addition to the Church, a rectory, a convent, and an
elementary school. Her grandfather's church was brown, and shaped like an
"A". There was a beautiful stained-glass window in the front that lit up on
cloudy days. The church was surrounded by green lawn and gravestones, thin,
gray ones, that had writing on them that was unreadable.
Much later in her life, Margaret learned her grandfather was Episcopalian
and that his religion was very similar to hers. At the time, though, it
seemed rather that their religions were miles apart. For one thing she had
been told Catholicism was the one, true religion; all other religions were
false. The only way he could get to heaven was if he didn't know any better
and believed his religion true. The problem was since he was a member of a
Roman Catholic family and married to a devout Roman Catholic, how could he
claim not to know? Margaret worried about her grandfather from time to time.
But then he did something that convinced her in her heart of hearts that he
would get to heaven.
It was spring and the second-graders of Blessed Incarnation were about to
receive their First Holy Communion. They had studied the questions in the
Baltimore Catechism and had been tested:
"Who made you?"
"God made me."
"Why did God make you?"
"God made me to know Him, to love Him, and to serve Him in this world,
and to be happy with Him forever in heaven."
"What must we do to save our souls?"
"To save our souls, we must worship God by faith, hope, and charity; that
is, we must believe in Him, hope in Him, and love Him with all our heart."
"How shall we know the things which we are to believe?"
"We shall know the things which we are to believe from the Catholic
Church, through which God speaks to us."
Margaret had done very well and she was ready to receive for the first
time the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ in the form of the communion wafer.
There had been a lot of practicing in Church. A lot of sticking out of the
tongue, a lot of pious walking up and down the center aisle, head bent, hands
brought together in the form of an "A". Just like grandpa's church, Margaret
thought to herself.
The Saturday before "the most important occasion of her life" (as Grandma
Conway described it), Margaret's mother took her to buy a communion dress.
The veil was to be provided (for a small fee) by Blessed Incarnation school
along with a pair of white rosary beads and a small prayer book bound in
mother of pearl with a gold crucifix imbedded in the front cover. It turned
out to be a rather unpleasant experience both for Margaret and her mother.
Margaret at seven years old was plump. Too plump, it seemed, to fit into
any of the pretty, lacy, white Communion dresses sold in the stores.
Margaret wanted lace and seed pearls and something called "organza" but she
had to settle for a plain white cotton dress with straight lines and no
frills.
"It was slimming," said her mother.
It was the first of many sad and unhappy shopping trips she and her
mother were to make together.
On the day of her First Holy Communion Margaret was summoned to
Grandfather Conway's house before she, her parents, and Grandma Conway were
to attend the ceremony. After he barked at her and she laughed, he told her
to open one of the small drawers in the roll-top desk.
He said, "I bet you'll find a present in there."
Margaret was sure this was to be a very special present since she was
about to touch the forbidden desk. Tentatively she drew open the little
drawer her grandfather had pointed to, and took out a small silver cardboard
box, the kind of box jewelry came in, the kind of box her father had given
her mother last Christmas.
It was a silver medal on a chain: a miraculous medal with a picture of
the Blessed Mother on the front and twelve stars encircling a large "M" from
which a cross arose on the reverse. Beneath the "M" were the hearts of Jesus
and Mary. Margaret held it gently in her hand and looked up at her
Protestant grandfather. Could it be that he believed?
A miraculous medal was supposed to have come directly from Mary, the
mother of Jesus. Over 120 years ago, she had appeared to St. Catherine
Labouré, standing on a globe with light streaming from each of her hands,
with the words "O Mary, conceived without original sin, pray for us who have
recourse to thee" surrounding her figure. Catherine was told to have a medal
struck in an exact likeness. Mary said all who wore the medal would be
rewarded with an abundance of God's graces. It was said the medal's greatest
miracles were those of patience, forgiveness, repentance, and faith. This
was the sort of thing only Catholics believed in. But could it be Grandpa
Conway believed in the miraculous medal? She knew Protestants were really
against likenesses and statues of saints. That they accused Catholics of
idol worship when they prayed to these saints instead of to God.
Margaret hugged her grandfather very tightly and her throat hurt and her
eyes stung. He helped her open the chain and put it on, closing it from
behind. Surely if he believed in the medal, he would go to heaven and be
with her and the rest of the family forever and ever, Margaret thought. When
they went to church, they left him there in the dark living room sitting in
his easy chair.
A year later Margaret was left to play in the park as her grandfather lay
dying in the blue-gray Victorian house across the street. Her mother and
grandmother kept vigil at the side of his bed which had been brought down to
the piano room at the front of the house. She was not invited to be there.
Something about not exposing children to the horrors of final death throes.
When her grandfather had been dead a very long time, and Margaret no
longer believed in miracles and visions, she would take the medal out of
the drawer on the right-hand side of her own bedroom dresser, hold it gently
in her hand, and think if there was a heaven, and she wasn't entirely sure
there was, her Grandpa Conway would be there, with her father and Grandma
Conway, barking at the children and making them laugh.
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