Grandma

I got the news today that Grandma passed on into heaven. She had a stroke on Christmas, and never regained consciousness. I can’t really do my Grandma justice with words, though my brother did a great job doing that – he’s the writer, not me.

I remember fondly her 80th birthday celebration. I remember even more fondly her 90th birthday celebration. We were looking forward to her 100th birthday celebration, which she was only a couple of years away from. Still, it will be quite a celebration this weekend – as my dad said, few people have lived so well. She touched so many lives. Heaven will be that much better now that she’s a part of it. I think that’s part of the joy of heaven, after all.

I can mark this day of her passing with some pictures of her that I collected a couple of years ago when I lugged a scanner with me on a trip to West Virginia. Consider this the picture album to accompany Britt’s post, Meet Virginia.

One of the earliest pictures I could find of her, with her friends Catherine and Sheffey. Grandma is the one on the left.

With some more friends. Again, Grandma is the one on the left.

With “the office girls.” She’s the one on the back row, on the right. Apparently, somebody once marked an “X” on this picture beside her so that we’d all know which one she was. Wouldn’t surprise me if it was Grandma – somebody probably once asked her, so she probably marked it so people would be able to figure it out later. She was very practical in that sort of way.

Grandma with Fred Mooney, my paternal grandfather that I never knew, with my dad’s two oldest siblings, Frieda and Gene. This was shortly after they moved back to West Virginia from Arizona, during the depression. After she and Fred got married, they went on a working honeymoon. They were in Arizona when the depression hit, and it took them years to work their way back home to West Virginia.

Grandma with Fred Mooney.

From left, Opal (a neighbor, I think), Grandma, my dad, and his closest brother, Doug. Dad was 12. Grandma had been a single mother since my dad was very young.

Grandma on her honeymoon with her high school sweetheart, the man I always knew as Grandpa. They got married not long after I was born.

This was the picture we always had of Grandma and Grandpa on our mantle at home. Nearly all of my childhood Christmases were spent in West Virginia. Not a Christmas goes by that I don’t think of them.

This was the last picture Grandma had taken at a portrait studio, taken almost six years ago.

If my life is only lived with a tenth of her enthusiasm, joy, selflessness, and love for God, I’ll consider myself a success. She was an inspiration to all who knew her, and lived her life to the fullest, all the way to Christmas Day, 2006. She was always on a mission to spread love and joy. May we strive to do the same.