Everything but the Kitchen Sink

Whatever we needed could be found in the depths of Grandma's magical purse.
By Nadia Ali

By my teenage daughters' standards, her purse was huge. Theirs were tiny things that could barely hold a lipstick and compact; they wore them on their shoulders just under their arm. Grandma's handbag, suspended by thick, black leather straps, hung down on her hip. It was big enough to hold everything you could possibly want.

One day we were all in the car when my daughter Shazara spilled some drink on the back seat. "Mom, do you have any napkins?"

"No," I replied.

Suddenly, Grandma reached for her handbag on the car floor near her feet and opened it wide. Her head almost disappeared inside as she rummaged around, pulling out a handful of napkins.

"There you go, sweetheart," she said as she handed them to Shazara. In my rearview mirror I could see my two daughters sitting there with a huge grins on their faces.

"Mom, there's a thread hanging from my T-shirt," Reece called out. Again opening the jaws of her handbag, Grandma rummaged in the darkness of her purse and retrieved a pair of scissors.

"There you go, love, " she said, handing it to the girls in the backseat. They sat with wide grins on their faces that itched with orneriness.

"Mom, I need a knife and fork!" said Shazara, trying hard to sound serious about her request.

Again Grandma opened her bag and her head disappeared into its depths. She handed Shazara a neatly wrapped plastic knife and fork in a white napkin. "Here you are, Shazara."

I could see the girls' faces, looking quite amazed. Surely they weren't going to ask their Grandma for anything else.

"Oh no, my hands are sticky," Reece complained. "Have you got anything that I can wash my hands with, Grandma?"

Again, she delved into the black handbag. I could see the girls waiting in anticipation to see what Grandma was about to produce from her bag this time.

"Here you go," she said, passing a wet tissue in a sealed packet to Reece.

We all laughed out loud when Reece joked, "For a minute, Grandma, I thought you were going to bring out the kitchen sink!"

Reprinted of Nadia Ali (c) 2004 from Chicken Soup for the Grandma's Soul by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen and LeAnn Thieman.