When our good friends the Gleasons retired they moved to Washington and started a book club. They brought together a wonderful group of people, led the discussion, and gave us dinner. (After the first year we started bringing a dish or two.) Every year Anne and Ted (who had been my religion teacher at Exeter, where I went to high school) come up with a broad theme such as "What Matters Most" or "Family." They choose an eclectic collection of books to fit the theme, each of which always seems to provide fodder for very lively conversation – funny and serious and everything in between. What's more we also have to write an essay and read it out loud at the last meeting of each year.

For the last two years I've written about my grandparents. My Virginia grandparents will be the subject of my next blog. And here I'll tell you about my Kankakee grandparents. The "assignment" for this essay was "Growing Up in America":

In New York City, when I was growing up, we moved from one apartment to another. We changed schools. President Kennedy was shot. My best friend’s father died. Things didn’t stay the same.

But, in Kankakee, Illinois, where my grandparents lived, nothing every changed. My sister and I visited every summer—and we stayed six weeks.

Grandpa grew the same flowers every year—marigolds and sweet pea. He was proud of his tomatoes too. He smoked a pipe and filled it with Prince Albert tobacco from a round red tin can. Gramma and Grandpa stuck to a routine—the washing on Monday—the clothes were rinsed in a tub filled with bluing before being hung out to dry; the ironing on Tuesday, the mending and darning on Wednesday, the cleaning on Thursday, the shopping on Friday, and the baking on Saturday.

Sunday was for church—Gramma always dressed up. She did her hair and powdered her face. She only wore navy, pink, or brown—those were her colors—the ones she thought were most flattering. The hour after church was spent analyzing the sermon with my aunt Marian and my uncle Jeff. Everyone had a cocktail—it was the only time all week that my grandparents drank—a Manhattan with three cherries for Gramma, cokes with cherries for my sister and me. It was my uncle who made them. Of course, everyone always sat in the same chair on the screened porch.

After the main meal—a big lunch on Sundays, pot roast, lamb, or beef stroganoff (even in summer), Ida—that was my grandmother’s name—would lie on the couch—seven pillows propped under her head—and do the crossword puzzle.

Grandpa played cards with us. We called him “Elmer the Shuffler.” We played chicken feed and war and spit and nuts. I can remember Grandpa laughing. He loved to play those games. We all did.

Grandpa also told riddles and made up stories about Miss Ouri and Miss Ississippi. (They were cousins.) He liked to tell stories too. About how Marian, when she was little, used to throw water on John (we called our parents by their first names) to wake him up. John was a late sleeper even then. Grandpa told us that he had never missed a day of work and that coca cola was scarce when Marian and John were growing up so they used to fight over it. We heard these stories more than once.

Gramma loved to count. She counted her prayers at night and the number of cookies she made. The numbers were high: on the order of 102 chocolate chip cookies and 43 pecan shortbread. She counted the number of times she exercised her toes. (She was big on exercise long before it became popular.) She walked around the block late at night and counted deep breaths.

That was because she had strong feelings about good health. Or maybe it was vanity. She added a handful of raisins to her morning bowl of cereal to keep her hair from turning gray. She washed her hair with coconut shampoo and rainwater—Yes, Grandpa had to put out the pans whenever it rained. Gramma also gathered carrots from her neighbor’s yard, squeezed them in an old contraption, and made carrot juice. She drank that once a week to make her eyes strong.

Gramma and Granpa didn’t travel much. Grandpa used to say, “There’s no place like home,” and when we asked him where he most wanted to go in the world he’d say “Gerry’s.” Gerry’s was the small grocery store around the corner. The time came when they could no longer live in their house. But I was married then and we would name our daughter Ida.

Now it’s my sister who makes carrot juice. I’m the one counting the cookies—and the deep breaths.