Sherry’s Blog

I recently fulfilled a promise I made to myself about a year ago. I visited an eighty-year-old friend who lives across town who remembered my mother’s side of the family when they were young.  His wife, too, remembers my mother’s people, and added a few things to our conversation. The couple is about 10 years older than my mom, who went with me on the visit. Mother is 77 years old, and our friends are in their late 80s.

The couple’s names are Hulon and Modena Ogle. Modena played an important role in my family, too. She was an Avon lady who used to sell products in our home from the time when I was a young child. Now, 51 years later, she still sells Avon.

A lively conversation about the old days took place. Here are some of the best tales:

My mother’s parents were Robert and Claudia Bowen Cole. They lived on Sand Mountain where the Ogles lived. Hulon remembered both of them being very tall, good-looking people. One amusing thing he remembered about Robert is that he always carried around with him a wad of chewing tobacco. Whenever anyone asked him if they could have a chew, he would charge them either 1 or 2 pennies.

Sam Bowen Sr. was my grandmother’s father. He used to come the Ogle home and sit by the fire in the wintertime and talk with Hulon’s father. Hulon liked to sit behind the adults and listen. He said Sam would sit up straight and give tips on how to save money. He once showed them at his own house how he would drill a three-inch hole in the log holding up the front porch, place cash in it, and replace the hole with a piece of round wood (probably the piece he had cut out).

Hulon said once one of the Bowen sons, he could not remember exactly which one, who was known to drink. He came riding along a road in a Model T half lit. He saw the Ogles trying to coax a hive of bees into a drawer in a wooden box. He called the box a “gum.” Now, Hulon said they knew no one who had been drinking should be fooling with bees. However, when Bowen son saw what the Ogles were doing, he got out of his Model T, picked up the hive, and place it in the gum. Hulon remembers the weather being extremely hot and humid that day. The Ogles were amazed that the Bowen son did the job so quickly and so well.
Hulon remembered the most about Sam Sr., a real stickler for saving money. They were once walking along, and Sam Sr. stopped and pointed to a rock. “You see that rock,” he said. “Three hundred dollars is under it.” Hulon went over and picked up the rock, and in a Prince Albert can was three hundred dollars.

Another story Hulon tells is that Sam Sr. bought a 1936 Chevrolet, green and white. This was a rare car because the majority of cars back then were black. He noticed a couple of Sam’s sons driving the car occasionally, but one day Hulon went to the Bowen home and noticed the tires were off the car and sitting in the car seats. “Isn’t that your car?” he asked Sam Sr. “Yes,” he told him. “If I don’t take the tires off, my sons are going to ruin the car.”

Seeing the end result of prayers is a wonderful blessing. One of my close friends has lived to see the fruit of her prayers.

She and her husband raised a family of children and suffered through the agony of seeing one of them struggle as much as any teen-ager has ever struggled. He ran away from home several times. He befriended unsavory folks. He started and stopped several educational programs, and took and quit several jobs. These are only four of his numerous other problems.

After more than ten years of such struggles, the young man found the right mix of schooling, a job, friends, and medications. He now lives a wholesome lifestyle, which is the best blessing my friend could have ever hoped for.

My friend? She never gave up hope. During the worst of her son’s struggles, she had to let him go and suffer the consequences of his own actions. She used the time to pray more fervently than ever. She asked others to pray. She carried on her own life and never wavered once in her Christian example to all of her family.

My relationship to my friend was always one of concern. I called her often throughout the ten-year struggle to ask about her son’s situation. Sometimes the news was good: Usually it was horrible. I admit I gave up on her son, but I never gave up on contacting her and encouraging her the best I could. I prayed often for him, for her, for the entire family, though, and never gave up on that worthy endeavor.

I am reaping what I sowed. My friend now contacts me often and inquires of a struggle I am living. Some days, when I think no one, not even family members, wants to pray for me another moment or listen to my sighs, my friend is there. Her words mean so much to me, but even more, her empathy is greater. It is bigger than any feelings she has about my situation. It is bigger than any discouragement she knows I feel. Our bond has grown closer than ever because as friends, we share the bond that Christians share, a mystery to those who do not have it.

My situation may take years to resolve. I have learned from my friend that time does not matter, though, as the mystery of how and when God works often befuddles us. Our biggest frustrations come in wanting Him to answer our prayers on our time, something He probably smiles about as He patiently controls our circumstances.

I am trying to look at the big picture, but it is the hardest thing I have ever done, being the impatient person that I am. It is easy, though, to envision my friend and remember how she minute by minute waited on God for ten long, long years. Thanks, friend. You showed me I can do the same.

The weather was so pretty Sunday afternoon I decided to take the eight-year-old grandson and his best friend, who is almost like my grandson, to Mount Cheaha. We wanted to walk the board walk, climb a few rocks, and grill out a few hot dogs.

The first two tasks proved easy, except the grandson is recovering from bronchitis. His strength lasted only until we got to the bottom of a mountain path. He could hardly climb back up. We stopped often to let him rest. Poor little thing’s legs were burning, he said, from the steep climb.

I am fifty years older than him. My legs didn’t burn a bit climbing up the mountain, which made me proud. I sure was glad, though, that those boys needed a rest when we got back on the board walk. We caught our breath and made it back to the car.

We drove to the playground where sturdy grills stood ready to cook our hotdogs.

I am an experienced girl scout, from fifty years ago. I thought I remembered how to start a fire. I placed crumbled newspapers in the bottom of the grill. The boys found twenty or so small sticks to lay on the paper, which I figured would catch on fire quickly. I added about ten pieces of charcoal, and started striking matches.

Darned matches aren’t like they used to be. As a child, I remember striking two-and-a-half inch matches with fat, bright-red heads with a puff of a white dot on top. The matches I had were not even an inch and a half long. The boys were too afraid of burning their fingers to even try. I tried, but that shrunken bit of red and white on top of those tiny sticks popped off instead of lighting anything. I went through two entire boxes of matches before the paper caught fire.

It burned heartily, for about thirty seconds. Then, no matter how much I fanned and blew on the paper, the flames fizzled out. The grandson brought over the roll of paper towels. I pulled off four, wadded them up and stuck them in the grill. No luck. The small streaks of orange ash went out whenever I moved a paper towel near them with my ice tongs. The boys suggested I lay the weenies on the grill. Good idea, since grease usually makes fire burn better.

The problem was that the orange ash had grown so faint that it emitted no heat. The other boy brought me a roll of toilet tissue. Now, nothing should burn as easily as toilet tissue. I tore off a sheet at a time, and laid it with my tongs directly on the decreasing number of orange ashes I saw. I couldn’t believe it. The ashes were so weak, they wouldn’t even catch toilet tissue on fire. I fanned. I blew. The boys scratched their heads.

Then we did what all experienced people of the woods do: We ate the weenies cold. Of course, we all had black ashes all over our hands, which gave the weenies a little extra flavor. As we ate, we took comfort in the fact that these problems had nothing to do with our lack of experience. The fault lies with those chintzy manufacturers of matches. Somebody ought to complain.

Last week, right before lunch period, I missed my new Hannah Montana powder compact. I remembered placing it on the edge of my locker shelf first thing that morning. I had waited until after classes to powder my nose. I wanted to look cool during lunch period because watching me all week had been a cute, red-haired guy.  I felt sure he would sit down and talk to me any day.

I looked in my locker mirror at my shiny nose. Yuck!  I blotted my skin with a tissue as I thought about the person I knew had stolen my compact, my best friend, Anna. I walked toward the lunchroom and the smell of French fries, fish sticks, and yeast bread. My appetite disappeared because my mind had focused on my problem with Anna’s habit of stealing.

A week earlier, Anna had taken a book from my locker that she needed for her class. Because of the theft, I had no book to use. On our paper, we both got a “D,” me for having no book to study, her for not reading the book after she stole it.  Still, I continued to share my locker with her.

What can I say? She’s my best friend. We’ve been together since the first grade. Now that we’re both in the seventh grade and have different schedules, we don’t see each other much. After school, though, Anna usually comes home with me. She has to. Her old man is always drunk. I feel sorry for her. Besides, if she doesn’t come home with me, she would go home with the crack-heads and the tenth-grade guys. Heck, she sometimes hangs out with them even when I tell her not to.

Anna is funny, different from my other friends. Many of them are nerdy. Anna is cool. She likes “outrage,” her word for doing crazy things. I am too scared to walk down back alleys, to jump out of her bedroom window onto the sidewalk, or to lift candy from stores. I admire some of her skills, though, like spinning on top of the escalators at the mall. She is so good at it, lying down on the rails and going round and round on her butt as one rail goes up and the other goes down. I would never try it, but I laugh hard at Anna doing it. I’m too shy for my own good, or at least that’s what Anna tells me.

Of all times for the red-haired guy to sit down next to me, it was the day my nose shined, the day I was hurt with Anna for taking my compact. The guy walked up beside me with his lunch tray.

“Hi,” he said. “I’m Ray. May I sit down?”

“Sure,” I said, praying he did not notice my freckles.

Thank goodness I had on my rosette-red lip gloss. Maybe he would notice my lips and not my nose. I smiled at him.

Then to show him I was somewhat adventuresome, I leaned down and sipped from a caffeine drink hidden in my purse. It was one  Anna had slipped into it the day before. Such drinks were banned from school, but I had to admit they kept me awake during math class. Anna always drank hers without hiding them. The teachers looked the other way: I could tell they got tired of dealing with her antics. Ray asked my name.

“I’m  Madison,” I said, as my faced turned hot.

“Why aren’t you eating?” he asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Worried about a test or something?”

“Something,” I said, as I sipped the drink.

“Want to talk about it?”

I almost said yes, but I didn’t know Ray that well. He’d probably be like my mom and tell me to leave Anna alone. Mom doesn’t understand, though. Anna is familiar to me, and the rest of these girls in this school seem snooty. Mom told me to invite some of the girls over, but our apartment is so tiny. Also, our apartment is run-down. I’d hate for them to see it. Anna doesn’t care that our apartment smells like mildew. She’s just glad to have a place to go besides her own.

As if Ray guessed what I was thinking, he pointed to Anna, who was headed toward the restroom.

“You know her?” he asked. “I saw you talking to her yesterday.”

“She’s my best friend.”

“Oh.”

The way he said it made me wonder if he knew something about Anna he was not saying. Lately, she had gotten more interested in boys, and she liked to flirt, especially with older guys. Lordy, I hoped she was not sleeping around.  Mom told me girls that did that might get a disease. I don’t quite understand how married people do not get a disease, but I didn’t ask Mom that.

A bell rang.

“I’ll see you later,” said Ray.

I was glad he had to go. I followed Anna into the restroom. She stood there holding my compact.

“You should’ve asked if you wanted to borrow my new powder,” I said, as I looked up at the compact’s tiny black brush Anna held in the air.

She blinked slowly and looked down her nose at me.

“I was going to ask you to loan it to me, but I couldn’t find you this morning.”

“So you took it?”

Anna powdered her nose one more time, replaced the brush, and then snapped the compact’s lid shut.

“Here,” she said, handing it back to me.

I was glad to see my compact in one piece. Without thinking, I opened it and noticed the compressed powder had a deep depression in it, as if Anna had used it every five minutes. I glanced up to see Anna watching me.

She cleared her throat.

“I saved eleven ninety-five to buy this,” I said, “and I wanted it to last awhile.”

“Be that way, then,” she said. “I don’t want your old compact.”

Anna turned toward the mirror and spiked her hair upward with her fingers, her black nail polish half gone from her ragged fingernails.
I knew from years of experience that she would now turn against me, making out that this was my problem. As always, I caved.

“I’m sorry, Anna,” I said, pushing the compact back toward her.  “Here, use it today but put it back in my locker tomorrow.”

Anna turned toward me, cocked her head, and pouted. She knew how to work me as if I were a cell phone.

She took the compact and opened it again. She pulled out the brush and drew it across the powder. Sometimes I hated myself for putting up with Anna’s crap. I wanted her to be my friend, though. I needed her to be my friend.

“Come over today?” I asked.

“How does this look?” she asked, putting on another layer of powder.

“Great, Anna,” I said. “You look great.”

Anna put my compact in her purse.

“I’ll meet you at the curb this afternoon,” she said. “Do you have any ice cream at your house?”

I nodded; then I turned to go to my last class. I left Anna still looking at herself in the mirror.

Near my classroom, I almost bumped into Ray.

“Wanna walk over and get a hamburger after school?” he asked.

I shook my head no. “I got plans.”

“Okay.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“Anna’s coming over to my house,” I said.

He nodded, but a frown swept over his face.

During math, I half-listened to the teacher. I worried about myself. Why was I willing to give up everything for Anna’s friendship? Surely, if I tried, I could make some new friends. Later, by the time I met Anna at the curb, I was wishing I had instead gone for a hamburger with Ray.

Also, the next day I asked the nerdy-looking kid with the locker next to mine how to change a combination. He showed me. I plan to change my combination soon. First, though, I have to  tell Anna. It wouldn’t be right to change the combination without telling her. We’ve been friends too long for me to mistreat her. I can tell we’re both changing, though, and Anna’s ready for a new set of friends. If my locker were hers, she would’ve already called me aside to tell me she had changed the combination.

At least, I think she would have told me.

My grandma was a short, heavy-set spitfire. She would not hesitate to step outdoors to tell noisy kids to shut up nor would she hesitate to jump into the middle of a family argument. Grandma was also a snuff dipper, a smoker, and a curser; traits that put spit in the fire.

Often, my three sisters and I would watch Grandma’s antics with wide eyes knowing we were not allowed to act like her. No matter her faults, though, we viewed her with eyes of love, and she had eyes of love for us.

Grandma never fussed at us when we picked her petunias, spilled a bottle of sorghum syrup on her table, pilfered through everything she owned, and ate all the bacon biscuits she left on the stove. Once, my four-year-old sister climbed up the shelves of Grandma’s flour cabinet and pulled it over onto her head, covering herself and everything in the kitchen with thick, white dust. Grandma only laughed at how funny my sister looked lying there as still and white as a marble statue, except with dark, scared, blinking eyes. Grandma got a broom and cleaned up the mess, which probably took a week.

As children, we also viewed our mother with eyes of love. She had (and still has) far fewer obvious flaws than Grandma ever had, and our eyes of love to this day allow us to accept what flaws she has. Now that we are grown, we all say that our Mother’s snappy comments, too-honest remarks, and jumpy nerves are “conditions of mature age.” Never do we tell her she has faults. Well, we do sometimes, but she ignores us.

One reason I have such a hard time focusing on Mother’s faults is that I remember how she viewed (and still views) us with eyes of love. I remember one time when she was under fire. One of my sisters did not shut the back car door on the way to school after Mother told her to. Mother zoomed backward out of the driveway, caught a tree with the door, and almost ripped it off its hinges. Mother got out of the car without a word, forced the door back into place, and told us girls to scoot to the other side of the back seat so we wouldn’t fall out. She never said a harsh word to my sister. Those eyes of love kept her always focused on the task ahead and on our good traits. Because of Mother’s eyes of love, we grew into responsible women without much shame and guilt. Mother’s style of discipline, which emphasized what was expected of us rather than what mistakes me made, allowed us to grow up with most of our worst traits falling away.

Each of us girls has stories to tell of Mother’s patient eyes. When we got old enough to complain that we did not have clothes as nice as other children, she did not chide us for whining: She went to work in a department store and dressed us from that store for twenty-five years, well after we grew up. Throughout our lives, Mother’s eyes of love have watched over each of us during both our happy and troubled times. Her eyes of love never change, no matter what we do or say or become.

Mother passed down her eyes of love to each of her daughters. All four of us have the same eyes for our children, no matter that we are flawed mothers who have flawed children. It is the magic of love that makes us perfect in the eyes of those who love us, that same love that binds all families into one loving, even if flawed, unit.

Eyes are love are what has given me one of life’s highest honors, the ability to see my adult children viewing their offspring with eyes of love. I see them whenever my children watch their children pray, sing, play, and laugh; and I see those eyes whenever their children fuss, pout, fight, and stomp. Children’s behavior shifts frequently; whereas eyes of love never change.

My honor comes in knowing that I am a link in my family’s chain of love. Because of the love I received and passed along, I have confidence that my grandchildren will learn what most all mothers know: Eyes of love are not found in the head but in the heart.

This is a tribute to Kughn’s mother, Sarah Elizabeth Parker Ford and to her late grandmother, Mattie Tula Annie Estelle Parker Morgan.

Read Psalms 78-81 about how David spoke to those who were unborn at his time of writing, which includes us. The NIV is my favorite translation, and if you do not  have that one, go to blueletterbible.org, and you can read it there. David writes in Psalm 78  that God’s will is that “the next generation would know the teachings of God, even the children yet to be born, and they in turn would tell their children then they would put their trust in God and would not forget his deeds but would keep his commands.”

As I think back over the years when I raised my three (and unknowingly would love three others as my own), I used God’s teachings to pattern my own life after, and I tried my best to teach my children all of God’s ways. I am so proud that they all seem to love God and follow Him because His way is the only way that leads to eternal life. I encourage my children and all of my other “children” in the faith to renew themselves to God’s ways every year, and as they teach their children God’s ways. Remember that it gets hard.

I especially encourage you parents with teenagers, or soon-to-be teenagers, as those are tough years. My prayer is that you will be kind even when the children are not, that you will show compassion on the children when they rebel and do things that turn your hair white, and that you will cling to God as you own marriage will be tested through the difficult years, as that is when Satan wants to destroy a family and start your children off on a bad footing.

I pray that the younger generation would stay in the church that God established and the one He gave His Son for. I know some of you are interpreting that a little differently from the way your parents do, but study your Bibles and seek God’s ways as close to the Bible as you can.

The principles that I embraced when I married and decided to fulfill my joy of becoming a mother have been godly principles that I do not regret, regardless of the pain that clinging to God’s ways has sometimes brought about. Doing right is not easy, and when I have made mistakes and sinned in my past, life was even harder then. The reason I do not regret following God’s ways the best I can is that God only promised us one thing in life, not the promise of a husband or children or grandchildren. He only promised that He would give us Christ, and the apostle Paul states and understood that Jesus is sufficient. The family I helped create is a wonderful blessing for me.

So, for Mother’s Day, I want to encourage you all to continue walking in God’s ways. It is every mother’s duty to remind her children to teach their children God’s ways “so the next generation would know them, even the children yet to be born.” Psalm 80:19 says “Restore us, O Lord God Almighty; make your face shine upon us, that we may be saved.” Before that, verse 17 says “Let your hand rest on the man at your right hand, the son of man you have raised up for yourself. Then we will not turn away from you; revive us, and we will call on your name.”

Christ is that name, even though David did not know it at the time of his prophesy.  God help us all to continue walking in that way.

Having a daughter only forty-five minutes away as opposed to four hours away is a new joy for me. She and I both needed time to talk earlier this week; so, we met between Birmingham and Anniston.

We typed into our GPS systems the name of a chain restaurant in Trussville and met there.  We decided to drive to another restaurant recommended to us by a store owner in Trussville, one chosen at random because we had no idea where to eat. We went to Costa’s Mediterranean Restaurant. Wow, go there, if you can.

We ordered Greek salads and split a chicken picata, a dish with clear broth sauce, noodles, sliced chicken, and delicious little capers. The normally rambunctious five-year-old with us slept on the booth seat throughout the meal. He was tired from an exciting day of loosing his second tooth and staying for extended play time at pre-school.

Daughter and I laughed, teared up, caught up, and ate. Then, we woke up Little Man and drove to a friend’s house, a friend from so long ago that she was the attendant at the guest table at my wedding.

My friend is animated. Little Man was awake by the time we sat behind her counter in her kitchen and watched her put away groceries, cook, and talk. Boy, can she tell stories. Little Man sat as if he were watching Doodle Bops. He sucked down spaghetti and meatballs. We laughed watching him as much as we did watching our friend.

Little Man got grew tired of adult conversation. My friend, always the mother, pulled out a box of tinker toys from what seemed like the air. He sat and played while we talked and talked and talked.

At about nine o’clock, Daughter put away tinker toys, took Little Man’s hand, and walked out to her car. In the dark, on the edge of the sidewalk, Little Man spotted a frog. They stopped to examine it before driving home. As she and he were riding along, he said, “Mama, God is good to me.” She asked him why he said that. “Cause today I lost a tooth and saw a frog.”

Little Man knows to look for the blessings in each day, a wise child, the offspring of two women who also know to look for the blessings of each day. The only difference between his blessings and ours is that ours are the form of beloved family members and friends.

A good wife, mother, and grandmother recently wrote a book for me, a writer.

Mary Ward Brown’s newly released book, Fanning the Spark, is not written for me exclusively, but her book nails several topics vital to me as a woman and as a writer.

Mary gave up her beloved task of writing for a long period of time to be a better mother and wife. She took a twenty-five-year leave from writing during her middle years, and did not take it up again until she was in her late seventies. I, as a mother and wife, wrote for many years for thirty minutes a day. That was all the time I allowed myself, as my responsibilities toward my family were great. I never wanted to do anything that robbed my family; so I know exactly what Mary went through. Even on thirty minutes a day, I managed to piece together two short memoirs of childhood that are so poorly written I would never show them to anyone. But, my writing kept improving, never, probably, to be at the level of Mary’s, but better for me.

Mary knows heartache. She wrote about her spiritual struggle to find Jesus and to hang on to her believe in Him. His teachings helped her overcome a battle with neurosis, which is usually referred to now as depression. Mary always wanted her life to matter to others, and the thought that it might not depressed her. In contrast, I have always had a faith in Jesus, but it has ebbed and flowed throughout the years. It is the most durable relationship I have ever found, though, and like Mary, who refers to a concept from the Bible, there is no one else to turn to who does for us what Jesus does. I do not suffer from depression, by contrast, but I have been affected by a family member who does. He wants his life to matter, too, and I know he will never be happy until his life matters to him in the areas that are most important to him.

Mary loves writing. She says it fulfills her in ways that nothing else does. She sometimes feels guilty taking so much time away from other worthwhile pursuits to write, but she feels compelled to write anyway. That is exactly the way I feel, guilty if I rob a family member of my time, but I feel compelled to write anyway. I am sorry if any family member has ever felt I have robbed them of my time, and not one has ever said it to me. I would give it up if they did.

Mary adores being a grandmother. I do, too. Her two granddaughters, who are now of college age, fulfill her and make her a complete woman. The love of those granddaughters comes as a reward after suffering through the loss of her husband through death and after raising a son who makes her happy because he has chosen to live near her. Mary says in her book that she is not as educated in scholarly ways as some writers. To me and to other of her fans, Mary is educated in ways of the heart, ways that being a wife, mother, and grandmother can educate us women. The passionate love for family shines in every one of Mary’s exquisite short stories.

Try to find a copy of Mary’s two collections of stories, It Wasn’t All Dancing, and Tongues of Flame. You’ll be so carried away with her writing, you’ll want to read Fanning the Spark. Her stories will spark you to read about her well-lived life.

I recently took a trip to another’s world, and I gained perspective on mine.

A fellow member of my faith invited me to come see her in Boise, Idaho, to spend time with her and her family, and to take a break from my own world. (Be sure to pronounce it with a “c” and not a “z” where the “s” is.)

What a world I found in Boise! First, I discovered a land like no other I have ever visited before. Boise is like a round, flat cereal bowl filled with about 200,000 people. The bowl’s edges are the foothills of the Rocky Mountains.  Boise is a desert, called the Banana Belt by its residents. It has much more moderate temperatures than other northern states: The mountains protect it from much of the onslaught of cold. The mountains often receive snows and ice, but the city gets  only occasional snow, white powdery stuff that my hosts said goes away after a couple of days.

What a family I found in Boise! My friend has a great husband and three lovely daughters, all of whom visited while I was there. Each daughter has a child or two, and I saw through another’s eyes how much I love my own family. They, just like me, have their ups and downs, but the love that binds them is strong.

What a church family I found in Boise! I met a couple from my own county here in Alabama. They once lived in  Alexandria and went to the church where my daughter-in-law attended as a child. They remembered her and her parents. We all knew lots of the same folks; and it was fun to fill them in on the friends they remembered. I met many other Christians who were as warm and friendly as those in my own congregation.

I returned home to my same old problems and my same old life. I also returned home to the things I love, family, writing, and a comfortable home to live in. One family member has a saying that is oft repeated, “Life is the same everywhere.” He is correct in saying that. As different as we all are, we all have more in common; and that is what binds us humans together.

I brought home a few things that I bought, some pamphlets and photos to share, and a good case of pink eye! But, pink eye is nothing that a few antibiotic drops won’t cure. Seeing life from the perspective of someone who is like me but different was worth having a few days of itchy eyes.

A week in Kissimmee, Florida, babysitting for a three-year-old granddaughter and a five-year-old grandson gave me renewed appreciation for parents. My son and his wife needed a get-away and solicited both grandmas to take over for them for a week. Whew. I forgot what a fast-paced road parents must travel.

There’s the morning preparation before leaving for preschool, starting with cereal eaten by children still in a sleep mode and ending with the locating of socks, shoes, a hairbow for one, clothes for both, backpacks, and sippy cups that had to be filled, one with chocolate milk, the other with apple juice. Never mind that caregivers must get dressed, too. There’s the tackling of car seats. How is it that children can get out of car seats in a snap, but they cannot fasten themselves in? I guess it is because manufacturers make the buckles as complicated as rubix cubes

Nowadays, parents must wrangle with videos mounted on the backs of front seats, a task we two grandmas neglected. Our lack of training in electronics made it easier to listen to “she’s looking at me,” and “make him stop copying me.” We grandmothers are familiar with the time-honored activity of riding in a car while bickering. It was good enough for our kids: It is good enough for the grandkids.

We grandmoms got a few hours to ourselves one morning. We poked our noses into every little adorable boutique and antique shop along the quaint streets of nearby St. Cloud. We especially enjoyed our kids-free breakfast at an old-hotel-turned-restaurant, complete, of course, with the delights of a Starbucks shop in the lobby. How do they make those desserts look so irresistible?

By the time we bought a few goods at a used kitchen and trinket shop, it was time to pick up the children. Of course, they were hungry and wanted to eat ice cream for lunch.

The afternoon meant nap time, video-playing time (which is an addition to the schedule for us grandmas), outdoor play time, and bath time.

Everything is manageable for two loving, mature, perfectly sensible grandmothers, except for bedtime. Broadway has never seen the likes of a three-year-old who cries because she is scared, thirsty, missing her blanket, missing her apple juice, needing another story, or nursing an imaged hurt toe or leg. She, of course, was taught these tricks by her older brother who probably regrets his past behavior. He gets no more sleep on his top bunk that what we two grandmas got. One night included hysterics by the three-year-old, who was only soothed by pretending she was patting an imaginary baby doll in Maw-maw’s hand.

The afternoon before I drove back to Alabama, I told the five-year-old that Mawmaw had to drive a long, long way back home. I was pretty shocked when he looked up from his coloring sheet, winked at me, and said, “You can do it, Mawmaw. You’re a tough girl.”

And, he was right. I drove home without too much worry about the duration of the drive. My mind was on how much I would miss the hugs, kisses, tears, and antics of two precious children.