men cry too

Mawsie’s house was on a hill. When she was old and I was young. After she died someone sat a bear on her porch. They killed it and stuffed it and left it there, because it was something to do and they didn’t want it in the house.

Her husband passed away some time back in the thirties. She never had another. She buried a baby without a name….a little boy with a long one…..a daughter whose man didn’t want her to live anymore.

In a rocking chair. Where the bear sits now. Sat Mawsie. Her hair black and bunned. Her house coat striped in red. Laughing. Loud. That’s how I remember her.

My grandfather buried his head and cried when his momma died. We never saw him tear. We never heard his pain. But we knew. Because Mawsie was gone…and my grandfather had never buried his head before.