A Special Sitting Room

Home again! All the cookies were wrapped, the pie survived the 1 1/2 hour drive, the grand-nephews were adorable, and the grandparents were as glad to see us as we were to see them.

Steve's grandmother is going to be 99 years old on New Year's Eve this year. Her hearing is weak, so is her vision, but she knows when her grandkids, great-grandkids, and great-great grandkids are in her home. She often confuses one with the other, but I think that is more a function of her vision than her memory. She sat upright on her couch in her sitting room... you know, the special room open only on special occasions, like Christmas and Easter when the family visits.

I don't have a special sitting room like that in my house.... I have a living room and a dining room, bedrooms and bathrooms, but no formal "sitting room." I don't have special dishes put away for some special occasion, either. We all sit on our best furniture in the living room, and we eat every day off of our best dishes, either a Corningware pattern or a Pfaltzgraff pattern ( I have two patterns, but neither is saved for special occasions).

I have never understood the practice of having a sitting room where no one is allowed to sit except on special occasions, or the need to have dishes to be brought out only for special dinners. I want to eat out of my best dishes every day. I want to sit on our best leather chairs every day. When you pay that kind of money for something, shouldn't you be able to get your money's worth using it?

I remember as a child visiting my grandmother's house in Waterbury, Connecticut. She had a special sitting room, too. We were never allowed in that room until Christmas day. Her house would have been so much bigger if she had opened it up for every day use. Like I said, I have never understood it. I suppose if I had a larger house with more rooms, I might consider having a special sitting room, but I seriously doubt it. A library, perhaps, an office space, or another bedroom is a practical possibility... even a room converted into one huge, organized closet space.. now there is a room to dream for! 

I suppose the special sitting room is more an idea than a practical solution. That's one room in the house that stays clean all the time. That's one room in the house you can allow guests into without worrying about how it looks because it's always ready for visitors. Maybe that's what it's all about.

I know today, when we walked into Grandma Collins' sitting room, she sat there straight-backed on her couch, as a Queen ready to receive her visitors. Her hair was fixed, her clothes neat, and she smiled her best smile for her family. Maybe in that room, she feels she must look her best, and maybe in that room she feels her best. As we sat beside her on the couch, taking turns for there were many of us filing through, she would explain the stitches on her face (she'd had a carcinoma removed just before Thanksgiving), or open a gift with childlike delight. She couldn't hear everything we said to her, but that didn't matter. She had her family around her one more day.

One of the youngest family members, a 5 year-old great-great grandson, easily spoke to her. His expressive eyes, enthusiasm, and storytelling skills entertained our matriarch, and anyone else standing nearby, immensely. He didn't know about her hearing or vision difficulties. He just knew she was Grandma, and she liked it when he talked to her. She never told him he talked too much, or too loud, or corrected his choice of words, or asked him questions he couldn't answer. If one looked very close, one would see that despite the age difference, they had something in common: happiness, joy, innocence, and an ability to live in the moment.

On the verge of ninety nine years of living, that is more than a good enough reason to be sitting in the special sitting room.