Thursday, July 10, 2008
Two lives well lived
John Long
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From the RoundTable blog
I don't enjoy going to funerals (does anyone?), so two in one week was an ordeal. But I was there each time to pay tribute to a remarkable lady, one I was lucky to know, if only peripherally. Neither of these great ladies will make it into history books, but neither will be forgotten by those who loved them.
Mary was only 76. She was the great-grandmother of my stepdaughters and a lovely lady in every way. Though not a blood relation to me, she accepted me as family and treated my children the same as her own descendants. They called her Grandma, too young to comprehend that genealogy didn't warrant the title. It was granted in love alone.
Mary was a simple woman from simpler times. Raised in the country, she held on to some anachronistic rural folkways and superstitions, like putting bacon grease on small wounds or gently rolling babies off of her bed to grant them protection of some sort. But no one could look down on her for a few quirky traditions, because at the same time she exuded a timeless wisdom and a tireless spirit of servanthood. Faith and family topped her list of priorities; herself she placed at the bottom.
Even when she was in her final illness, we'd ask how she was doing. "I'm fine. How are you?" She meant both parts of the response, though the first was not true. But it never occurred to her to complain.
And man, could that lady cook! At any potluck meal, you headed straight for what Mary had brought. Whatever it was, it would be good. She'd probably spent days preparing it.
She spent her last five years (almost to the day) without her beloved husband, Albert. Toward the end, she was ready to go. She knew what was waiting for her on the other side. I know she wasn't disappointed.
Lena, or Dearmom as the family called her, was my wife's great-grandmother. She was a generation older than Mary -- an amazing 106 at her death. Few of those 106 years came easy. She was widowed and left with three young children in 1941, when her husband unexpectedly succumbed to an injury. Only a few years before, she had been baptized into her church, and it was that determined faith that sustained her through the trials to come.
She persevered and provided for her three kids in a day when single mothers were almost unknown. To know her was to respect her, then to be amazed by her. Lena became legendary for her quilts and her candy-making. Pretty much everything she produced she gave away, of course. It wasn't about her.
She, too, valued faith and family ahead of any other considerations. My wife remembers fondly her weekend visits with Dearmom -- a teenager happily choosing the company of a lady then in her mid-80s. They'd make candy together, ride the bus downtown for a hot dog, and watch college basketball while eating homemade pizza.
My wife was a stepchild too, by the way, not a blood relation. But I don't think Dearmom ever noticed. Love takes no thought for such artificial distinctions.
I never met her until she had passed a century of life. But still she was an impressive person. At 101 and a half, she performed a pantomime performance of "Silent Night" for her church Christmas service that still brings tears of remembrance to her congregation.
Neither Mary nor Lena died rich or famous. They had so much more than that. The preachers at both funerals praised these lovely ladies for their selfless lives. But they couldn't begin to describe the impact they had. Nor can I. It will be felt only in an immeasurable generational sense.
Jesus said that the greatest love is to lay down your life for others. We usually think of this in terms of someone heroically dying to save another, but there are other ways to lay down your life. In service to others, for instance -- a long life lived by putting others first.
I was glad to know Mary and Lena, if only for a while and not as well as their closer relations. Here were two lives well lived, lives that touched others and made the world a better place. I hope at my funeral and at your funeral, friends and family can say the same.
Long, a Roanoke Times columnist, is director of the Salem Museum and teaches history at Roanoke College.
