Grandma taught me how to impart my dignity when I offered advice or a compliment. Frances Isobel Christie was quick-witted but spoke sparingly. If she complimented me, it left me glowing on the inside for a month.

I’m the same age she was when I was in my teens. Our conversations were different from those I had with other women. I often recall her kind sense of humor and firm gentleness of spirit.

The first months of Grandpa’s retirement were challenging. Grandma leaned on her innate strength of character. Gandhi couldn’t teach her anything about peaceful, non-violent protest.

Grandma was sitting in the car, with a hat pinned in place, on curly black hair with two white wings. She was perfect.

Lipstick blotted and bright red adorned her smile as she returned her husband's gaze.

He stared at her in speechless wonder, for she was only wearing her slip. Grandma had plumb forgotten to put on her dress.

That was the moment Grandma declared her strike.

She quit rushing to please Grandpa. He had pushed her too far since he had retired.

Grandpa became a man without a mission. He had no minions to manage, so he attempted to manage Grandma in the first months of his retirement.

They had an arrangement while he went to work every day. Grandma managed the home and household routines, the office was his domain.

Once retirement hit, he found himself at home. My uncle was at a boarding school for people with Down Syndrome, and Aunt Anna was at school or her part-time job. So that left Grandma.

He questioned everything she did and followed her, suggesting much better, more efficient ways to do things. One day, about suppertime, Mom got a call, and I knew something had gone wrong when she listened for a very long time after first saying, “Hi, Mom!”

She covered her mouth as if trying to stop a laugh from escaping.

“You’re going to kill him?” Mom asked Grandma.

I knew Grandpa had finally gone too far if he had angered Grandma enough to have her phone Mom at suppertime. She wasn’t peeling potatoes while crisping chicken or shredding lettuce if she was talking to Mom.

Grandpa was efficient. He had a specific time he wanted to eat supper to maximize his digestion before he went to bed. Six-fifteen was forty minutes late.

“So, you didn’t make him supper tonight?” Mom questioned.

“You declared a strike!”

“For how long?” slipped in.

“As long as it takes, or if you kill him sooner.”

Helping to prepare the salad for supper, I stayed quiet so Mom wouldn’t think about me overhearing. She kept repeating the juiciest bits, so I was all filled in.

Grandpa thought he was a power that could not be limited. I didn’t know if he would take a strike seriously, but once Grandma put her foot down, she wouldn’t give it up easily.

There was further discussion about Grandma visiting us by herself and an agreement to pick her up on Friday when Mom went into town to buy groceries.

I stayed quiet when the intergenerational fires began to flare in my family. I learned young to gather information and never let them know what you know.

Grandma usually talked to Mom and my aunts. The men in the family liked to stand outside and kick the tires now and then as they would ‘shoot the breeze’.

My father was more discreet with his word choice when talking with me and my sisters. If I played with the dogs, they all forgot I had ears. If they all went to Catholic confession and paid $25 for swearing like Alfred, the boy who cursed at school, told me he had to do — well, they would all be broke.

Acts of desperation follow quickly

After supper, Uncle Ryan drove into the yard, a swirl of dust rising as he didn’t slow down on the hard dirt drive. Abrupt and breathing hard, he skipped greetings, just asking.

“Where’s your dad?”

I motioned toward the corral, “Thank God!” he stomped off.

I knew he meant he didn’t want to see Mom before he spoke to Dad. My daily chore was to fill the water pail at the hand pump and water each plant in the vegetable garden. I picked up the water to fill it, and was close enough to hear their conversation. I’d been reading Agatha Christie mysteries lately and was picking up on the techniques of Hercule Poirot.

Dad came to the corral fence, and Uncle Ryan didn’t even wait until he climbed over to begin talking,

“You’ve just got to stop her! Barb can’t let Mom leave Dad right now!”

I could tell Dad was trying to figure out how he didn’t know what his wife was up to. My parents spoke about their concerns with siblings or parents when they were alone before sleeping.

“Whoa-a-a! Slow down there!”

Dad spoke to Uncle Ryan like he was talking to our horse when it was worked up over the horse flies. Uncle Ryan stepped back and let Dad climb over the corral fence. They were even closer to me now as they leaned on the rails.

“Just start at the beginning…”

Uncle Ryan sputtered with frustration.

“I had to make Dad and me a can of beans tonight. I stopped in to talk about taking Dad fishing tomorrow. I walked right into hell when I opened their front door!”

Uncle Ryan was almost yelling as he kicked the corral fence board. I had never seen him so worked up.

“She went on strike! Mom told Dad that if he was retired, it was time she could retire too! She was done with working for an aggravating, nosy boss. So, she quit. She just quit being Dad’s wife! She told him he had changed the job description months after they married, and she just went with the flow. But, after he retired, he was doing it again, and working conditions had become intolerable!”

Her last words to him in their car, sitting in her slip, wearing no dress, were.

“I’m on Strike!”

Grandpa was wise enough to let her have time to cool off before he asked her at three in the afternoon what she was thinking of cooking for supper. It was like he turned a towering white cloud into a hailstorm. Uncle Rick repeated what Grandpa had told him, adding.

“Dad looked like some aliens had body snatched Mom. Or maybe they just took away his wife and left a seething tigress. I had to get out of there for a while. I went and bought myself some snacks. With Mom on strike, I’m not sure when I’ll get fed. I bought some cereal, milk, and bread, but when I came into the kitchen, I overheard Mom talking to Barb….”

My water pail was going to overflow, so I had to stop pumping and take my water to give the plants in the garden a drink. I knew that my parents were going to have a complicated pre-sleep discussion.

Transitions like menopause and retirement can clash

That night, I sat down with a notebook and wrote: Grandpa wants…

At the top of the next page, I wrote: Grandma wants…

Trying to think like Hercule Poirot, I wrote two lists.

Here is Grandpa's list:

1. Someplace to go to do work that a man does.

2. He needs a purpose — a project,

3. He feels like he lost the keel on his boat; he needs to talk about that with someone who gets it.

4. He could use a retired friend.

5. A week away from home would change things up.

I didn’t know how to make these things happen for Grandpa, but I was pretty sure that even one or two happening would help him get used to being retired. I set my list aside and turned to thinking about my grandmother.

Grandma’s List involved finding out more about going through The Change. Most of my aunts whispered those words behind their mother’s back when she carried a fan for five years in her fifties. I learned it was called menopause, and now it has already happened to me. But I can’t get the cart before the horse and tell you a good story, so let’s stick to the little I found out when I was twelve.

1. She needs to be able to make decisions in her castle, her home.

2. She wants some solitude to do things that are interesting to her.

3. She wants to be free from looking after other people, like she did for her babies.

4. She could be kind to her body — it’s not the same, and she gets flustered when rushed.

5. If everyone went away, she would like a quiet week at home alone, where she doesn’t take care of anyone else.

6. She knows her purpose, but others don’t hear and take it seriously.

Finding My Writing Voice

I have been writing about life and puzzling events happening to people I love since I was twelve. I kept notebooks and sometimes never returned to open them again. I have been changing that recently.

The two lists I just shared with you were discovered in a search for notes needed for another story. Something made me stop and open the small orange notebook, turning pages to find some of my earliest efforts to put thoughts and feelings into words. The roots of insight and love shine through the words on those pages.

I never shared those lists with my parents or grandparents, and Grandma called off her strike after Grandpa agreed to set up a woodworking shop in the basement. At least that’s the part of the negotiations I heard about.

I learned that one of my purposes is to find my voice for each story I share. My Grandma made good use of her solitude. She had honed that skill when my aunt and mother were young and Grandpa was sent to fight in Europe. She kept everything rationed and functioning for the whole war. When Grandpa returned, he brought war fatigue and a desire for military efficiency to the household.

Mom was terrified of her father - at first. Grandma responded with firm gentleness. Her work-to-rule campaign involved no kindness or affection for him, but efficient square corners on beds, with no desserts prepared. Nothing extra was provided; Grandpa was back in the barracks.

No word of complaint was given, but no explanation of her lack of enthusiasm was provided either.

It didn’t take long for Grandpa to come home with flowers and ask her opinion. They planned a way to make their family work for everyone.

Upon first meeting them, you would think my Grandma was quiet and let my Grandpa rule as King of the Household, but looks can be deceiving. If Grandma was unhappy, not much happened in the kitchen, or anywhere else. She would slow down when Grandpa called for something from the living room peremptorily. Pretty soon, Grandpa would get up and help himself.

There is power in firm gentleness.

Note: I promised