Three Generations

My sweet Grandma, me and little Zeefa. This photo is from our recent visit down to Missouri to celebrate Grandma's 80th birthday. Most everyone made it in...a big, joyful group in all. As I was thinking about what to put in the first post here, I was also looking over the pictures from our trip and came across this one.

It seems like a blink ago that I was back on their farm in Kansas, spending summers with Grandpa, Grandma and all the other family and folks that gathered there to keep things running. Being the oldest of 20-odd grandkids, I was initiated early into "helping" milk the cows, feed the calves, clean the barn, work the fields, clean the farmhouse, get the meals ready, and most importantly, watch the littler ones.

As a kid, of course I failed to see the treasure in such an existence. Sure, the obvious joys weren't lost on me, but often, they were at least partially gobbled up by all the "slaving away". As such, I remember complaining a lot about having to get up so dang early and work so dang hard. But, goodness, twenty years later, the memories are almost unbearably bittersweet.

I remember the lists most of all. Well, that and the manure adventures, but I'll spare you the ripe details. Grandma was in charge of keeping the homefires burning and the folks fed, so as an able body, I was brought into the working fold each morning with a "list". Grandma loved her lists. Years later, I am surely her progeny for this reason alone. Is there anything so gratifying as making a to-do list for your day and crossing each task off in smug satisfaction?

Grandma's lists were usually written on the back of a discarded letter-size envelope, one side neatly slit open and contents purged days before. The blotchy-ink writing would get momentarily diverted along the lines of the folded paper, but quickly found its way back to a decipherable word in a single task. Occasionally tasks were marked through before they even reached assignment to me; reconsidered or accomplished already by the matriarch in the chicken hours of the morning.

These mama-days, I have perfected the art of list-making. To the point of obsession, no doubt, but each list holds a whisper of her and those languid days. Somewhere in my need to be Efficient and feel like I Got Something Measurable Done That Day, I am always reminded of the love and care and mothering of a much-beloved Grandma.

Unsurprisingly, she was an early and earnest supporter for us adopting from Africa. In one of the many unsung ways she has done over our long history, she brought rain to soil that was getting parched. She devoured emails about the progress we were making on our adoption and in the process etched one phrase in particular on her heart from a note (regarding some recent update pictures we had received for the children) that she often reminds me of when I am on the phone with her: "How was it you said that? Oh, yes, 'Our baby girl is about as much sugar as as you can stuff in a ten-pound, four-month-old little body.'" And then I hear the smile slowly make its way deep into her cheeks.

Awhile back, I was talking with her on the phone, as we don't often enough do these days, when she said something that stopped my heart. In her mellowed, soothing voice that you need to slow down to take in, she told me there was something she wanted me to know: "In all my years, I never dreamed I would have the privilege of being (Great)Grandma to two precious children from Africa... I just want to thank you for that."

So, sweet Grandma, Happy 80th Birthday. You have loved well and we are all the better for it.