From Grief to Gratitude, (From Happy Memories to Epiphanies)

                                        For My Grandmother, Ethelwynne Linn

"That I may be filled with joy,when I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am persuaded is in you also." 2 Timothy 1:4 -5

(My small self on the left, defiant in my underpants, and Grandmother, praying for me on the right with Dad and Grandad ) 

I had my grandchildren over one day to visit and the boys took off, as boys will do to go down and play in the stream that runs in front of my house.  To get there, you have to traverse a steep hill full of cactus and trees with thorns.  I have many times had to pick cactus needles out of the neighbor kids and my grand children. On this particular day, however, Hannah, my grand daughter was with us.  She was only two years old at the time, and far too little to traverse the hillside, the cactus and the stream.  I told her she could not go down with the boys.

I went about my business, thinking telling her would do the trick, but when I looked up, there she was halfway down the hill, headed right into a thick batch of cactus.  In terror, I got up, ran down the hill to circumvent her path, and yelled at her to stop.  “Hannah, go back up the hill! “I shouted.   And then an epiphany occurred for me, as I watched her put her little hand on her hip, wiggle her shoulders, shake her head and respond to me, just as loudly, “No!”  She continued through the cactus patch, without getting one scratch, right down to the stream. 

The epiphany was this. Here was a little girl, who had an idea, and would not be thwarted from it.  She is just as I was at her age.  Some things are inherent.  Like stubborn wills. 

My Grandmother Linn was a stern woman, with very particular ideas about how little girls should act and dress.  She came from that generation of women who were elegant and tasteful.  She was blessed with one grand daughter who was born to be a tomboy.  I say blessed, because I cannot think of another term that she would have used tastefully to describe the trauma I put her through when I went to live with her and Grandad just before and shortly after my Mama passed away.  I say shortly because within eight months, she also went to be with the Lord.  I often wonder if the stress of having a tomboy in the household caused her to give up on living.

One particular incident will forever stick in my mind.  She was doing the dishes, with me standing beside her on the little stool, impatiently waiting for the next dish.  I must have been eyeing the great outdoors through the window, and she noticed that I was not paying attention to my chore of drying the dishes.  So graciously, she told me, “Why don’t you go outside and play for a little while?”  In truth, she might have just wanted to get things done quicker, without me to slow the process down.  I have to hand it to her, she knew what I wanted. 

I was joyous!  I had so wanted to be free, outside running around, and so out the back door I went, and straight up the big Russian olive tree that was just outside the door.  I pulled my dress up to get a better grip on the trunk and the branches and made it all the way to the top.  I was ecstatic looking out over the farm.  I could see my Grandad working in the garden, the barns, the chickens, the neighbor’s house and barns, and even a little glimpse of my grandmother’s face through the corner of the kitchen window.  And then Grandmother came out to call for me.  What did I do?  Nothing.  I just sat up there looking down at her.  As she became frantic, calling me and calling me, I repositioned myself to get a better grip on my branch, and she looked up.  The look on that poor woman’s face was priceless.  If white people could turn any whiter, well let us just say she turned nearly transparent.  And she called frantically for my Grandad.  I watched as he walked in from the garden, asking her what was so wrong.  She pointed up at me, and said, “Susan is up in that tree!”  He scratched his head for a minute, looked up at me, and said, “You ok, girl?”  I nodded in assent, and tenaciously held on to my branch.  Problem solved from his perspective.  He looked at grandmother and said, “She will come down when she gets hungry.”  It was nearly dark when I did come down, but she greeted me with happy arms and a kiss.  I never did figure that one out.  I guess she should have punished me, according to her standards, but she never did. I think she thought her disapproval of my choices was punishment enough.   

It was only many years after she was gone, that I realized how much I could be like her, and found that my sense of adventure, and my willingness to put myself at risk to achieve that adventure where inherited from the one person I always believed to be the most careful.

It was within her diaries that I found this information. Those diaries that ran over the course of many years dated 1912 when she was 26 years old to the date of her death in 1960 when she was 74 years old.  They speak of everyday life, but I found something far more interesting than her genealogic research and her detailed documentation.  On the pages of those diaries lay the record, in her own hand, of a woman who rode coast to coast on horseback alone. This at a time that women did not do these things.  I find a woman who picketed for the Suffragette movement, that I would have the right to vote.  I find a woman who was fearless in her pursuit of knowledge.  Most importantly, I find a woman who trusted God for all of her days. For running through and through those writings, she declared her love of God and her pursuit of Heaven.  

I know my Hannah has definitely inherited the Scot genes of persistence, stubborn defiance and indomitable will.  I hope she also inherits a love for Jesus, and a pursuit of His heart, that I received so graciously from my Grandmother. I did not see this in her life, most likely because I was too young to notice.  But there in her writing, in her scrap books, in her little notes on items, I found her profound love for Jesus!

      

From Grief to Gratitude ( Precious Memories, Part 1)

(Please take a moment to listen to the song by Donny McClurkin.  This song speaks of trusting the Lord, no matter what.  My Mama would have loved it!) 

I read this little saying once, and have used it so many times over the past few years.  “Don’t cry because it’s over, be happy that it happened!”  That may be hard to do, but I have attempted over the past year to remember this whenever I am tempted to lapse into grief mode again.  More specifically, one day I was driving down the road with the radio on full blast, as is my custom.  A song came on that was one of my best friends’, Rose, and my songs.  I burst into tears.  In that instant, I could also hear the Spirit of God telling me something and I opened my ears to hear Him.  “I would rather have this grief in my life, than never to have known her at all.” 

So in these dark days of getting past the sadness, I remember happy times, and most of all I pull from those insanely hilarious times or just profoundly funny times to get me past the tears.  You know those times; when someone just did the human thing: a face plant, a foible, an intentional notice of something that made everyone laugh or something that touched my heart and changed my life.

I want to put these down in writing, just in case I ever get dementia and cannot remember who I am or what I am doing.  Bear with me over the next writings, as I put into words the things that made and still make me laugh, and remind me how happy I am that those ones I miss so much happened to be in my life. I will start with my earliest memories first. I will attempt at the hilarious first, since that usually brightens me up, but I also want to reflect on the beautiful spiritual moments I spent with each of them. 

My Mama - Ada Mae Williams Linn.   

When I was about five years old, my mother was busy cleaning the house, and I was busy, following behind her and messing it up.  She was a little bit irritated with me to say the least, and although her general way of dealing with my behavior was usually soft and kind, on this particular day, she had had it with me.  She gave me a lecture, which made my little self so angry I told her I wanted to run away.  She did not argue with this, but pulled out the little overnight suitcase and started packing it for me. Then she set it down for me and said, “There you are.  All packed.”   Indignantly, I picked it up, went out the front door, and started down the street toward the orphanage at the end of the street.  In my small little mind I pictured myself living at the orphanage, and boy was that going to make her sad for talking to me that way.  It seemed I had walked miles, when I finally had to put down the suitcase, and sit down to cry at the injustice of the world. About that time, my Grandad was driving up the street and saw me sitting there crying, and stopped.  He leaned out the window and asked me where I was going.  I told him I was running away because Mama was mean to me.  He then got out of the car, came to talk with me and gave me one of his famous lectures, kindly spoken, that hit home with me.  He then picked up my suitcase put it in the car and drove back toward the house.  When we entered the door, Mama said to me, “So, you are back!  Let me help you unpack.”  I never tried running away again.  In her defense, I am sure she was watching out the window as I went down the street, and the distance was actually only two houses down from ours. I know she was watching over me as I exercised my five-year-old independence.  As she has ever since she went to be with the Lord.

And I remember too, those deeply touching moments with her, which were many.  I think she knew she did not have long on this earth and wanted to be sure that I knew where she was going and that I would be all right without her.  Just a year after my attempted leaving home, when I was six, she took me to see “Bambi”.  After the movie, she explained that although Bambi’s mother died, the father was there to watch over him.  I did not understand for many years what she meant, but somewhere in my teens that message came through loud and clear. 

The most poignant moment I remember with Mama was one Sunday morning.  I was far too ill to go to church with Daddy and Harold, so I got the pleasure of staying home with Mama.  The television was on, with a preacher named Oral Roberts, having all kinds of people come down to the front of the church to be “healed”.  I noticed people who were taken down by others to be “healed” jumping joyfully because they were now well.  My mother was watching as she sat in her chair, where, by this time in her life, most of her days and nights were spent. I curled up on the arm of that big chair next to her, watching in awe.  Then I said to her, “Mama, why don’t we go there and that man will touch you and make you well!”  

She pondered that for a moment.  Her response has stuck with me all these years and has been one of the simplest statements of trust in the Lord that I have ever heard. With these few words, she told me that she had accepted whatever the Lord allowed in her life.   

She said “Honey, if the Lord wanted to heal me, He would do it right here.”

My Mama went to be with the Lord just 4 months after making that statement.  Her acceptance of the Lord’s will in her life, no matter what it was, will always be a moment that I recall as the most profound statement of faith that I have heard. 

Lord, for the brief time I had with my Mama, and for all that I learned from her, I am grateful!

On to the next precious memory, My dear Grandmother Linn.