“They’re just junk made in Hong Kong, you know,” my mother said, dragging on her Merit Ultra-Light 100 as she sorted whites from colored over the washing machine. “Your grandmother has no taste.”
That hit me in the gut. It was the first time I felt an emotion that I cannot name.
I was about 10 years old, and my grandmother had given me something that was very special to her, and very special to me. I had hurried home to show mother the wonderful presents that had made me so happy. That my grandmother would have given me this present, these small items of beauty that she was fond of, touched me and filled me with wonder.
She loved me enough to want to make me happy by giving me something that made her happy; I’d never experienced anything like that before.
This is what she gave me.
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