Lucky to Be One of Grandma’s Girls
After recently celebrating Mother’s Day and thinking about my grandmother, I decided to write about her. I lost my paternal grandmother, Doris Elks Jones Oakley, at the age of 80 (in 1997) and I still miss her. Throughout her life, she was a hard-working woman and a good cook. My dad was the oldest of her thirteen children. With thirteen children (a husband, two stepchildren and whoever dropped in) to feed, she knew something about stretching a buck, feeding a hungry crowd and, of course, living close to the land. They sure don’t make ’em like Grandma anymore 🙂
When we visited, Grandma usually had a pot on the stove and her house always seemed to be filled with an inviting aroma. If I close my eyes when I think of her, I can hear her chuckle and smell something good cooking even now. My dad’s family farmed and as my dad tells it, when he was a boy my grandmother cooked a lot of water biscuits and pots of dried beans to fill them up. He says that back after the depression, they got so tired of eating rabbits (that they had trapped) that sometimes they traded rabbits to some of his kin folks for preserves to go on his mama’s biscuits. I guess between making the clothes they wore and keeping their stomachs full, my grandmother didn’t have a lot of time for extras like making preserves.
(The old photo on the right was taken in the early 40s and is of my dad and his oldest siblings~ Hazel, Larry, Helen, Ronnie and Linwood. My dad is in the middle on the back row. After my grandfather died, my grandma remarried and had a second set of children for a total of thirteen biological children. When they were coming along, the more children a farm family had, the more farm hands they had. The family picture at the end of this post was taken at my parents 40th Anniversary Celebration in 1995 and it features my grandmother surrounded by 8 of her 10 surviving children~ my dad, Ronnie, Helen, Charles, Linwood, Gene, Carolyn and Hazel.)
I do know that my grandmother was a good woman who loved us all – her children, grandchildren and great grandchildren. I can still see her sitting in the middle of a room with all of us laughing and talking. I have always loved the times that we get together and have considered being a part of my big, colorful family one of my greatest blessings.
What I wouldn’t give to have one more piece of Grandma’s chocolate cake (you know the kind with a dozen or so thin yellow layers and fudgy icing) and a cup of her strong coffee while we talk about the latest family news like who is getting married, who is having a baby or who is sick. (In a big family like ours, somebody is always getting married, having a baby or sick.) Wish that I had paid closer attention when I had the chance and had more talks with her and gotten more of her recipes.
I sure do miss you Grandma and I feel lucky to be “one of your girls,” to have loved you and to have learned about living close to the land from you!
With great love and affection,
Carolina Carol
CLOSE TO THE LAND 