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How Grandma showed us her love

Growing up, I spent every Christmas Eve at my Grandma Mary Pencek’s house on Ocelot Street in Dunkirk. She served Wigilia, the traditional Polish Christmas Eve dinner.

I remember relatives, Polish food, presents from extended family, dress-up sweaters that were too hot for me, and anticipation of the Christmas morning hoard to come back home. I also can’t forget when we all passed around the “oplatek,” or Christmas wafer — a tradition where everyone breaks off a piece of each other’s wafer and wishes each other good tidings and blessings in the upcoming New Year.

Most of all, I remember my grandma, whom I miss dearly.

She never really had much to say, but she made sure her family was taken care of. Taking care of family was really the only type of thing that was important to her. Nowadays people can be family-oriented — not as much as they used to be, but not as little as some would have you believe — but, everybody has to express themselves. Grandma may not have had time for much self-expression, raising five kids alone after her husband died in 1963, but she never seemed to have the desire to do so, either.

Actually, she expressed plenty — through actions, not words.

Through letting her house get taken over every Christmas Eve by dozens of family members, including us unruly grandkids.

Through cooking an elaborate Wigilia for everyone.

Through getting us expensive presents — and as we grew older, cold, hard cash — even though she was not well-to-do.

Through her huge smile on Christmas Eve after a successful dinner, watching contentedly as her far-flung family caught up with each other.

When Grandma moved to Lincoln Arms on the corner of Fifth and Main in 1997, she sold the Ocelot Street house. The Christmas Eve gatherings moved to my mother’s residence in Fredonia, but it somehow just wasn’t the same as going to Grandma’s home. (Maybe part of that was that I was grown up by then, too.)

And now, Grandma is gone, too. She died in August 2016. Christmas won’t ever be the same.

This Christmas season, I suggest all of you take a good, long look at your loved ones and give thanks to God that He has allowed them to be there with you. At some point or another, you will not be able to join them. But you can keep your holiday experiences with them in your memory bank, ready to be called up at any time, as I have with my Grandma Pencek.

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