For as long as I can remember, my grandmother seemed old - as I suppose grandparents do to their grandchildren. I only ever remember her with soft, permed while hair and a slower pace to life. The image of her playing solitaire at the dining table or sitting in the recliner watching Wheel of Fortune or Jeopardy or Matlock will forever be a part of my childhood.My grandmother was a woman of another generation. Born in 1923 in Oklahoma, she was a child of the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl and, as a young woman, she lived through World War II. In the 50s, 60s and 70s, she raised five children on a farm and on a budget. And she was not just housewife and a mother, she was college-educated and had a career as a school teacher too.
When I was little, her house was only a few hundred yards down the dirt path and by the time I was eight, she came to live with my family. I always remember spending time with her after school. She may have been retired, but she never lost her desire to teach.
By the time I was two, she had put a needle and thread in my hands. By the time I was four, she was teaching me to read. By five or six, I was giving her a run for her money at card games like Skipbo and Uno. She'd help my sister and I with our homework and we'd help her with chores.
We all moved into a house on a small 3-acre lot in the country surrounded by farm fields and irrigation canals. We weren't farmers, by any means, but we always had a few livestock at any given time and occasionally we would plant a vegetable garden or harvest wild rhubarb or watercress.
In the back yard, we had an apricot tree that was planted long before we ever lived there. It stood tall shading the yard and always had more fruit than we could eat. In the summers, my grandmother would have my sister and I gather apricots before the birds could get to them and she would make homemade jam. We would eat it on toast or banana pancakes and share jars of it with the neighbors. Because of her, apricot has become my favorite. And today the jam - and mason jars - make me think of her.My grandmother passed away two weeks ago and last week would have been her 88th birthday. So in celebration of her life and her birthday, I rolled up my sleeves and pulled out the Ball mason jars and cooked some homemade jam. Cooking jam may seem "old fashioned" - like my grandma - in a world where you can easily pop down to the grocery store and stare at shelves of any flavor imaginable. But what I've found is that cooking jam is something that I love. It slows things down in this busy world - savoring the moments and the flavors of life and really moving to a life that is more connected with the seasons, the earth and with others. Thank you, Grandma, for teaching me that. Happy Birthday and may you rest in peace.
