Jane: There Used to Be . . .

"Do you know what happened to Grandpa's bible?" I asked Bill on the phone the other day. "Did you find it when you sorted through Grandma's stuff?"


"Was it that big Abingdon Bible Commentary?" Bill asked. Grandpa H. was a life-long Adult Sunday school teacher at the Methodist Church.

"No," I said. "It was a black bible, and it lived on the end table in the living room, near that big greyish chair he used to sit in, the one that Grandma had recovered after he died. Don't you remember it sitting there? It had lots of bookmarks in it."

We talked about it for a while--about Grandmpa and his study in the upstairs of the house with Grandpa's big desk (Bill has that now, in his office at work), and the two shelves of commentaries and books of 19th century sentimental poets.


Bill didn't remember the bible on the end table--he was 5 or 6 when Grandpa died. He didn't see it when he sorted through stuff.

"But I know where it is," he told me. "It's in your memory. And it's sitting there on the end table. And you know you can always find it there."

And he's right. It's right there, and Grandpa's right there, too.