The Cedar Chest

It is one of the first memories of my grandmother's house. The wave of scent when the big carved lid was opened. I was four, and just tall enough for my nose to be peaking over the base as the lid creaked up and up and up releasing the perfume as it did. Overwhelming me.
Like Pandora.
I knew what was in the cedar chest.
Linen.
I wonder if Pandora was as disappointed in the contents she found.

But that scent, filling me up, catching my breath, making me sneeze it was so intense. I knew right there and then this chest was magic. No bottle of scent was in it. It smelled like this all on it's own. It's rough red interior, like the inside of a giant's mouth or Aladdin's cave, the hold of a pirate ship, my own horse drawn carriage. Sweet smelling magic.
It was the first exotic thing I ever encountered.

So today, as it's delivered to my house, I notice how much smaller it seems, and wonder, was I really only ever up to the base of it, and on my tippy toes? It comes to just above my knee now. But I could still sit inside it and sail away on pirate adventures. If I chose.
What I choose is to keep my underwear in it. To open it every day. Wake up to it's scented greeting, and smell it on my skin. Always.

It is my grandmother's house-warming gift for my first flat.
"Nothing will warm your home like the sweet smell of a cedar tree".

I was crying at her generosity, blurred eyes staring as our shared memories of my visits to her house ran like a home movie. Silent, full of emotion. We would watch technicolour films together. Saturday afternoons on the sofa with the ancient crochet blanket. Then all inspired, she would watch me run to the chest, and play on it, in it, unpack it, dress up in the ancient lacy linen, a bride, a fairy princess, and once, a nun - the afternoon of 'Black Narcissus'. She let me pack it all up again, hide treasured possessions in it, fall asleep in it, hide 100 Chinese orphans in it, sail off to Zanzibar and back again before supper in it. Create a magic forest or a whole kingdom - dripping with gold and complete with elephants after 'The King and I'.
All in the magic cedar chest.

I looked at her, blinking tears out of her eyes, and said
"I can't take this, it's hundreds of miles away, where will you store your linen?
We laugh at how lame this sounds.
"That's why you'll need part of me with you dear" her voice is breaking, "So I know you'll have something to remind you how loved you are.
Speechless we hug for an eternity. She pulls away first and adds,
"And when you pick a man, pick one who likes the smell of cedar. Down to earth. Reliable. They're the ones that'll surprise you when you least expect it. Stay away from those musky types, their scent goes on the turn quickly.
She fixes her apron and nods her head sideways and, bidden, I join her
downstairs for tea.

The movers arrive and I show them up to the room so they can pack it. The gap it leaves in my grandmother's bedroom seems enormous and my heart pangs with the worry of leaving her. The rectangle of the carpet's original colour blaring out against the age-bleached room. How will it be for her waking up to this reminder every day?

When my grandfather died she had to give his armchair to a charity shop. The shape of it, of his way of sitting, his body traced there opposite her, but he was gone. The gap where his head had leant back to rant on about countless newspaper articles she never read until he'd finished with the paper. Even if she'd bought it in the morning, she would not open it herself until after he had read it that night. As a teenager I rallied her to not be subservient and claim equal rights to read the paper brought into the house.
She silenced me with the calmness of her response. And I saw her for the first time, a woman who knew who she was, and of all the things she was, subservient was not on the list.
"I do that out of respect, she said. "Out of love, and respect. She nodded, pouring the last of the fruit cake mix into the loaf tin before she looked up at me and smiled.
"And that's my wish for you dear, that you find a man you can both love and respect.

I have picked out the place for the chest, away from the direct sunshine of the window, but near enough that the warmth of the day will help the scent rise for the evening.
Rise in a call to this man.
The man I can both love and respect.