When I was little, my dad would drive us to my grandparents’ place in Chicago.
We’d visit for family things. Dinners out or dinners in.
Well, that, and to pick up the dry-cleaning. They owned a chain of dry-cleaning stores.
Sometimes, we’d borrow one of his employees to work as a maid.
They all looked so sick and weary.
Carbon tetrachloride cleaning solution. Nasty stuff.
My grandfather died from that stuff.
And dozens of his employees. Dozens.
You don’t tell your children about this kind of thing.
My other grandparents ran a grocer’s warehouse.
We just visited for free food.