spoken for

I’m sitting here… it’s Wednesday night and I’m writing for my blog in Microsoft Word while I wait for wax to get hot enough for colors and scents.

I do this because my littlest brother is staying over and not only is he tying up my TV with his Xbox, but also my DSL modem. :-) So here I am. They did this a couple of weeks ago on a Saturday, too. He had his friend with him and those two and Steve traded off playing the game until they had to leave. My mom said that was it, she was tired, so he left his Xbox here and Steve stayed up until 2am playing it! I was shocked when I found that out, he can’t usually seem to stay awake past 10.

Anyway, I just sitting here doing some transcribing. I have in my possession my mom’s baby book. With it are three poems written by my grandmother as well as more papers that are kind of journal style that my grandma kept for my mom.

This is very neat to me, see, I never met my mom’s mom. She died in 1963 when my mom was six years old, my aunt eight, and my uncle three. She had a brain aneurysm. Mom told me once, and only once, about the day Grandma Betty (as we grandkids call her) died. They were out at a store and she was looking at blonde hair color, my grandpa having joked about wanting her blonde (she had dark hair) and she was complaining about headaches for I think quite a while before then and she told my aunt to get out from behind her because she thought she would faint. They left then, and my mom said that Grandma started going into convulsions in the car. They went to the hospital, but it turned out to be too late. But I also wonder if they could have done anything for her in 1963 anyway, for one of those in the brain. Since I still have both of my parents, I can’t imagine what it is to lose one of them (although I know that I eventually will), let alone be six years old and lose your mother like that.

However, reading my mom’s baby book and these poems and even looking at photos and the old 8mm films my uncle had put to music on vhs tapes, all of that makes me feel closer to the grandmother I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting. I long to know the wonderful woman behind the words. Here are the three short poems that she wrote on her type writer in the pale red ink…

BABY TALK
No wonder baby’s jabbering
Seems baffling to all others;
The privilege to understand
Has been reserved for mothers.

MY MISSION
Lord, I begged, give me a mission,
Some great work to do for Thee;
Lead me to some noble task that
Men may find thy love in me.

Even as I prayed, my children
Crowded round my bended knee.

Why, I wondered, does the Father
Overlook my urgent plea?
Surely He desires our efforts,
Poor and humble though they be.

Could it be, in His great wisdom,
He’d already answered me?

In my long and fevered searching,
I had been too blind to see
What the Father, wise and loving
In his plans, would have me be.

HAPPINESS
Happiness has many houses
And dwells in many places;
It lives in many moments
And shines in many faces.

It laughs with little children
Whose hearts are free from pride,
It seeks a sunny meadow or quiet fireside.

It haunts the house of service
And knows the place of prayer.
Where broken hearts are mended;
Happiness is there.

Happiness has many houses,
But mostly it will come
Where faith and love are living,
Where God can make His home!

So I copy all of this down now - to have and to hold and to keep, just in case I am not the one chosen to pass these precious things along to.

At least my brother hasn’t tied up the stereo as well, I can get Sirius through our satellite system out of the speakers. Maybe tomorrow I’ll work more on the transcriptions, I need to do the journal. I think I’m going to go turn on Swing Street and curl up on the couch with my book for a while, after I pour these candles. Ahhhhhh, blackberry brulee, smells SO good…