The Trousseau

Grandmother loved to tell the story of her cedar trousseau chest.

Almost her entire life it had rested just past the foot of her bed. Her father had bought it for her from a master craftsman while she was still a young girl. She lay inside it the various gifts given to her in anticipation of her someday marriage, once the right man would appear to offer his hand. Quilts with patches the colors of spring flowers, tablecloths soft as snow and jewelry passed down from dead maiden aunts lay in wait there for the day when she would make a house a home.

Her children and then later her grandchildren loved to sit on the trousseau. When grandmother became bedridden, it was moved a little distance and put against the wall opposite the bed’s foot. It was often used as a place to rest meals in the process of being served and then her small armory of pill bottles was kept there too, in a repurposed plastic recipe box. It also held a selection of magazines for visitors to read. Her home care assistants would sit there and talk to her. So it served well as both a table and an armless chair. But the curious thing about the big cedar box is that it hadn’t been opened in nearly seventy years. There was a strong lock and no key.

Grandma loved to tell how Grandpa Joe had chosen her. Joseph was apparently quite the catch in those days and his affections were spit between Rose, the “town beauty” according to Grandma, and herself. It all turned out well since Rose met another young man and eloped with him to Europe. Grandma would laugh when she told us how…