Grandmotherhood

One of my favorite memories is of three-year-old Dale running barefoot through the house squealing, "Grandma Jo, Save me! Save me!" while Honey Gail crawled across the carpet behind him, growling like a bear. Dale easily out-ran the enemy and squeezed himself between my knees and the kitchen cabinet. With a fistful of my jeans held securely in each tiny hand, he peeked out from behind my legs and laughed as I scolded his young aunt, "Go away, Bear! You can't get Dale. He's Grandma's precious baby boy."

 

More than thirty years later, while going through the chaos of divorce and missing his small son, Dale had one drink too many before getting behind the wheel of his car. He was arrested for DUI and sent to prison.

 

When this life-shattering news reached me, echoes of a small boy's voice drifted across the years ... "Grandma Jo, save me! Save me!"

 

Many letters bearing a prison address were dropped through my out-going mail slot during the next 32 months. Each letter began, "Dear Precious Grandson." Each letter ended with some variation of, "You're going to be okay." Between those beginnings and endings, I talked about everything I could possibly remember, from troop trains soaring through my hometown in 1942 to high school kids dancing in the street in 1953. I told him about going roller skating with his grandfather when we were fifteen ... about marrying young ... about joyously welcoming our son, Dale's father, into the world when we were still not quite nineteen. I shared every scrap of information I could find about his ancesters.

 

Through those letters, I was holding my grandson's hand

 

When A grandma sees a toddler lose his balance and fall, she picks him up, kisses the hurt away and holds his tiny hands in hers until he feels secure enough to try walking by himself again. When a grown man temporarily loses his way, Grandma's invisible arms reach across any distance to hold him tight until he once again stands tall and proud.

 

Thank God the terrible time has ended now. Dale weathered the storm. He held strong. He survived.