by Paul Gagnier

Created on: January 07, 2008

Her paisley print house dress was a blur as she slipped in and out of the sunlight, kneading dough, tasting cabbage soup, or mopping the floor. Preparing for Easter Sunday, she was in five places at once. She knew that solid Polish traditions held a family together.

Ignoring the rush of the 1950's outside her door, my grandmother, then over 70 years old, ran her city home as if it existed on a piece of Poland's countryside. She had a coop for tasty pigeons, a pen for rabbits, fruit trees, vegetable beds, medicinal herbs and mounds of firewood for the cast iron stove.

Science and technology were unimportant. To her, the appearance of fireflies or the new moon signaled the next stage of planting in her garden. Doctors were to be avoided; the garden provided poultices and a jar of swimming leeches by her bedside served to draw off infections. Neighbors had appliances and television sets, but Mary Hupka had strong hands and many years of tradition behind her.

After coming to America, the Hupkas, like many immigrants, worked in factories. Returning from a full day in front of machines or pushing a broom, they went back to their nearly self-sufficient home, continuing their work well past sundown.

My grandfather was responsible for fulfilling the endless need for firewood, which was somewhat difficult to find in the city. To me, it seemed as if he were perpetually pulling his wagon up and down the streets, collecting their wood fuel and chopping it up in the yard. Covered in sawdust, Paul Hupka kept the house warm, but it was Mary who kept it stable.

Easter made her sparkle. Days of cooking and preparing were made meaningful when she took the time to pray and reflect during Good Friday's "hour of silence". Her deeply wrinkled face quivered with silently mouthed prayers while rosary beads clicked softly in her hands. Afterwards, with a renewed glow, she rushed back to her cleaning.

Food had to be ready by Saturday, the day before Easter, for me and my grandfather to take to the church for the priest's blessing. Selecting a tiny twig for a handle and a bit of bent tin from a can for a funnel, Mary used the melting wax from a lit candle to make intricately colored design on dyed eggs. She lined an old handwoven basket with clean linen and loaded the food in, using the Easter eggs as bright garnishes.

She waited for us to return from the church with the year's supply of holy water for the true cleansing of her home. She had scrubbed all of its surfaces to the best of her ability,

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