Poetry Challenge, v. 4.0, Day 20

Wow! I'm actually getting to this post on the day I'm supposed to!  It's like a Christmas Miracle!!  You're welcome for that earworm.  But you know, sometimes, life turns out a few really great moments, and I have to share one with you today.  See, this weekend, while my family is gathered to celebrate my nephew and one more milestone that he's taken, I'm staying with my grandmother, which allows my parents to attend said blessed event.  I love my Gram.  She is an amazing lady at 93, and speding time with her is somethng I cherish.  She's bright, witty, funny, and has lived a life so full of activity that frankly, I'm a bit jealous.  I wish, even though she tells stories of the depression-era problems, of the way that life was so much harder than it is today, of the differences in community, responsibility, societal niceties, that I could have lived through half the things she has known in her days.  She is awe-inspiring.  Her strength and wisdom are things I can only hope to one day achieve.  And she is the inspiration for today's poem.

Grandmother Stories

My grandmother tells stories.
I hear of people I'll never meet,
of tough lives that only made sense,
of the flood that turned a ten-mile walk into seventy,
and of the time her hand was caught in the washer.
The list is long, names of strangers even my mother never heard,
but they did something that meant the world to a now-old lady.
She smiles a lot as she talks,
living in the days of her youth,
as a young woman,
a newlywed,
a mother,
a grandmother,
memories that begin 35 years ago
and only get older.
Sometimes, amidst the circular telling of tales,
I hear the same one over and over.
And I wonder if that will be me someday,
telling stories of my life.
I only know that I will tell the stories
my grandmother told me today.
They're good stories,
and they make my life worthwhile, too.

Thanks for reading,
The Fat Kid