Grandmothers Are Great Teachers

As usual I am up early this morning. I like the early morning when all is quiet. I enjoy watching the dark become light. Today it is misty and a little cool, but not cold.

During my meditations this morning, I am drawn into the thoughts of the Holiday Season. These thoughts lead me to remembering the ones who have contributed to my life as a child growing up. I was fortunate to be born into a large extended family. (I am the oldest child in my family).

Today, I am reminded of my grandparents and how they contributed to my growing up years. I have friends in my life that didn’t have the luxury of knowing their grandparents. I feel for the younger generation in my family that didn’t get to know our grandparents, aunts and uncles, and my own mother who have passed on.

I was fortunate to have known three grandmothers and two grandfathers, some who lived until I was grown and had children of my own.

One of my grandmothers passed away before I was married. She was my step-grandmother, although I never really paid much attention to that aspect. To me, she was Grandma A. I was about five years old and still remember the day she came to live with us. She was a robust woman with twinkling eyes. She was able to get around very well considering she had a wooden leg. She always wore dresses she made herself with an apron, (something you don’t see much anymore). Her shoes fascinated me, they were sturdy shoes with at least an inch high square heel. I don’t remember her ever changing the style of shoe she wore. I remember her having two pairs of the same style shoe, one pair for Sunday and the other pair for everyday. Grandma A moved in with my family, to help care for us children while our parents worked.

I remember Grandma A, putting five children all under school age, down for a nap. She would rock the babies to sleep while us older ones would be eating lunch. Once we were done with lunch, she would convince us to lay down while she sat in a rocker and read a story. (Usually a Bible story). She was a Christian and believed in taking advantage of witnessing and sharing at any given opportunity. I’m sure by this time of the day she was in need of this rest time herself. This memory stayed with me as I was raising my own children. It was a tactic I used to get a little rest in the afternoons.

Grandma A, believed in children learning responsibility. I remember her teaching me to do dishes. Me, standing on a chair in front of the sink full of dishes and her sitting on a stool supervising. I may have been six years old at this time. I would wash and rinse the dishes while Grandma dried them, stacking the dried dishes on the counter and letting me put them away.

As I got older, Grandma A taught me to iron. There was a specific way to iron clothes and she should know as she did laundry for a living before she came to live with us. I remember her telling me to start with the collar of a shirt, moving to the shoulders and onto the body, leaving the sleeves for last. In time, I did get this process mastered, but I remember to begin with, by the time I got the sleeves ironed, the body of the shirt was all wrinkled. I think Grandma A had to redo my work more often than not, but she never gave up teaching me how to get it right.

Grandma A, moved with us to the small dairy ranch, where most of my growing up years were spent. I remember she had a very shrill voice, that could be heard where ever we were on that forty acres. You could not ignore her “YooHoo” no matter where you were, and she knew it. Sometimes as children we tried to ignore her calling us, (it usually meant there was some chore she wanted us to do). Eventually, we would get hungry and end up going into the house, only to find Grandma A, sitting patiently on her stool, with that chore list still in her mind. To reinforce her call us home, she made sure, we did whatever she had in mind, before we were able to stave off those hunger pains. My children would tell you this is a tactic I used on them as they were growing up.

As children we went to church with Grandma A on Wednesday evening, (especially if our parents were working), Sunday morning and evening .

Wednesday evening was Prayer Meeting. After listening to the preacher for an hour, we would kneel in front of the pew, while everybody prayed. Now by this time of the evening, I was tired and usually fell asleep. Grandma A would thump me on the arm to wake me up so I could listen to all those prayers. The other kids being younger would get to sleep, I’m sure because they would have disrupted the service.

I really like Sunday Evening services. These services had little preaching and a lot of singing. The congregation would take turns picking out a hymn to sing, then someone would go to the front and give a testimony as to what God was doing in their life. That part was boring unless a juicy tidbit floated out, like who they happened to witness to that week. This testimony was usually accompanied by the sins of the one being witnessed to. Today I would call this gossip, but as a child, it was fun to hear stories of other people not being so good. (Usually adults)

Sunday morning services would include Sunday School. I remember my Grandma would ask our Sunday School teacher for the Scripture verse we were supposed to memorize for the week. She would then make us recite the verses while we were doing our chores during the week. We were always able to recite our Scripture verse the next Sunday. Reciting these verses to the Sunday School class was one thing. The preacher however, decided we needed to recite these verses in front of the whole congregation. That experience for me, even at that young age usually ended up a fiasco. Major memory loss, would set in, when I had to get up in front of the congregation. I think that is actually called “stage fright”, which I did get over later on in life.

Grandma A. lived us until I started high school. I will always remember this woman as a very patient, loving teacher, as well as being thankful for her presence in my life growing up.