Some Of My Things Part 10

 The Memoir

I had a dream of creating some books to encourage family members to write their life stories. The books would have writing prompts and places for pictures. Tutor The Heart Publications was my own invention and I did a limited run, printing, collating and binding them at my local print shop. 

My mother-in-law Beth was the first to send her’s back to me completely finished from the Texas panhandle. I was so impressed! She included stories, pictures, no one had actually seen before, and even recipes. Why did she spend so much effort and time on this project? Well, she had a deep love for us but also a very deep love for teaching her children about their ancestors. She worked tirelessly on genealogy research and made multiple copies of everything so that each child had their own copy. 

My children loved the stories she told about their dad. She thought his building model airplanes was very interesting. Once they were finished he hung them from the ceiling and she would navigate through the airplanes when cleaning his room. She laughingly recounted how he climbed up on the roof and jumped from there onto the trampoline. While these stories were not all in her Cherished Memories Book she did include a hilarious story about her father and the run-away car.

I can imagine her voice telling the story with occasional “ya’al’s” thrown in and the phrase “ya’al’s lil’ doll” used to describe her grandbabies. 

Beth was an excellent cook. She didn’t describe herself that way but what made her excellent was her consistent use of the recipe. She followed directions exactly. My husband could never understand why my dishes were always a little different because his mother’s recipes were always the same. Improvising was unthinkable and unnecessary. When she came to visit she always brought her recipe file in case she could cook us dinner. Along with her recipes she sometimes brought ingredients that might be unavailable where we lived. We often made a trip to the grocery store to purchase a forgotten item while making dinner. How different from my mother who only went shopping on Fridays. No other days, just Friday.

The Southern Peach Coffee Cake was included in her memories book. The secret ingredient was a tablespoon of butterscotch pudding powder. During the 1960's an 70's canned goods were a staple 

Tall, proper, and always gracious are words I would use to describe her. I learned to be grateful when I was with her because she exhibited gratitude in both speech and behavior.  She was a cheerleader for all her family, lauding achievements of others and encouraging us to be better. I am not surprised that she speedily returned the empty memories book full of her stories and charm. She did it out of love.