Happy Birthday Granny

Many of you know how much I love my granny. She’s the most inspirational person I know. She survived living in West Dallas when it was unincorporated land. It was just outside Downtown Dallas. West Dallas was where the poor and the criminals lived. 

She went crossed eyes at three years old, her whole life was dependent on others. She was not happy about having to ask. She didn’t want to owe anyone. You can understand the attitude if you lived in her neighborhood. 

In 1930 her father died from Phenomena, hard to say if was work-related. Her father was digging out the foundation for the Sears Tower. I have a postcard that shows using horses to chart off the rocks and dirt. 

My granny is the youngest and was living at home when her father died. Her brothers were on the dark side of the law, they helped feed the two.

There are many actions you’ve taken that are inspirations but this story I love the most is.

Granny married at 17 years old and her marriage was over shortly after my father was born. Taking the Trolly to work in freezing cold. It’s also WWII by then, you couln’t even change jobs, all jobs related to the war were frozen. She raised my ADHD dad by herself until he was 10 years old and she marries my gramps. We never talked about it but I’m sure there were some hard times with my father adjusting.

My granny would clean houses to make extra money for my clothes. One day she fell from the 2nd story and crushed her ankles and feet. This may have stopped someone else but you were determined to get out of the wheelchair.  I don’t recall how long it took but you were walking with a walker soon.

Close to 20 years later, granny woke up and could not walk. Since we had no idea what the problem was we took it day by day. The only thing I could do was make it fun so I acted like her wheelchair was a race car. I would push her down a straight section and hop on to see how far we could go, I would make all types of car noises like revving your engines. She loved out.

Nothing broke your heart like Dady’s suicide, but you didn’t give up on life.

I held your head so close to mine, I wanted to feel the relief live her body.

I love you!

Melinda