What I found when I returned to my grandmother's house
Three decades earlier, my family would drive every summer from Winnipeg to Calgary just so we could spend a couple of weeks with my Grandma (my mom's mom) and Grandpa. We'd pull up to the front curb and there they would be, just waiting for us with the biggest smiles and the warmest hugs.
By Trevor Dineen
Quick question — if a stranger knocked on your door, would you let them come in and roam around your house?
Quick answer — hell no! We've all seen enough afterschool specials to know to avoid that scenario the way a Kardashian avoids common folk.
But what if that person had a microphone, a producer and a co-host with them and they told you that the house you were living in used to be their late grandmother's?
Still no? Okay...you're a little heartless now but I understand. It's good to be cautious.
So how about this... what would you do if the kind, young (okay... middle aged) gentleman pulled out some old photos from 1984, and started showing you images of himself as a toddler, standing in front of your house, and playing in your living room?
That has to open the door to memory lane, right? Thankfully, it did for me.
I was now literally a step away from walking into my grandmother's old apartment, an apartment that I hadn't been to in over 30 years and one that I never thought I'd see again.
It's amazing how time just disappears. Three decades ago, my family drove every summer from Winnipeg to Calgary just so we could spend a couple of weeks with my grandma (my mom's mom) and grandpa. We'd pull up to the front curb and there they would be, just waiting for us with the biggest smiles and the warmest hugs.
Now to be clear... this was the 80s. There were no cell phones, so for all I know, they could have literally been standing there for hours, just cursing us for being so late. But bless their sweet grandparent hearts, they never showed it.
Their apartment represented the purest joy a child could ever know. We would be fed chocolate and candy at a rate that would surprise even Willy Wonka. We could stay up late (10 p.m.) and run and play as much as we wanted. This was our Narnia (minus the talking lion).
So as I took my first steps into that apartment again, all of these memories came flooding back. The place seemed so much smaller than what I remembered, but I could still see my grandpa sitting in the kitchen, wearing his grandpa robe and drinking his grandpa coffee.
And my grandmother walking down the hall toward me, grinning from ear to ear while laughingly saying, 'Oh, Trevor' with the kindest, warmest voice.
These old faded memories I had stored in my mind were suddenly becoming so vibrant again.
And that's when I realised I needed someone else to see this. So I Facetimed my mother.
She once told me that this apartment was the one place she always wished she could see again, that it held the most special of places in her heart and how she once drove past it years ago but couldn't bring herself to knock on the front door.
Now what kind of son would I be if, while standing in that apartment, I didn't help grant that wish? So I did and let's just say, her reaction was beautiful.
From the second I turned the camera to show her the front door, my mother broke into tears. And as I walked into the house she was washed away with a flood of emotion and memories. Although she never lived there herself, for those 10 minutes that we walked around that apartment, my mom was home again and her mother was right there with her.
So thank you, to the kind family who so graciously let a stranger into their home. Thank you for allowing me to give my mother something she had waited 30 years for. And thank you for not questioning why I wanted to lie down on the floor of your walk-in closet.
I'll see you in another 30 years.