Today is the anniversary of my grandmother’s death.

I was exactly seven years, six months and twenty eight days old when my grandmother died.

My mom has told it a million times – how she came to find out. My father probably not wanting to deal with having to comfort her said my grandmother had been in an accident and my mom had to go to her. She recalls in disappointing tones how death was the farthest thing on her mind through the two hour journey to my grandmother’s home.

Family members had converged at the house; the women started crying when they saw her and that’s how she knew. She doesn’t remember passing out but remembers my brother Joe who was a little over a year then, slip from her arms.

Stories and memories of my grandmother has taken a mythical place in my life, She has somehow become a role model and iconic figure in my life, she’s up there with the saints and superheroes. She has an awe inspiring life story of fairy tale proportions.

My grandmother at a young age was forced to marry a much older man. In those days when women resigned to their fate, prayed and made the best of things; my grandmother found the courage to flee her unhappy marriage.

She’d go on to make something of herself. She built a business, a house and invested in stocks.

She never remarried though she had a gentleman companion. She lived a great social life.

My grandmother is one of those people you’d refer to as a good Christian woman and have it mean something. She was principled, kind, generous and loving – all who knew her loved her.

She left a great legacy

My great aunt Felicia (my grandmother’s sister) once told me that my grandmother lived a lifetime for all of us.

I’m so proud to have come from her house, proud that a woman like her came before me.

She was a feminist even before the word meant something.

She blazed the trails so that I never have to settle.

It hurts me that I never really knew her and I wish more people had.

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