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Category: Getting Back to My Roots | Posted: Sun May 10, 2009 5:21 am

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My mom and I were talking today.Somehow, the conversation got around to inherited traits and conditions. My mother then made the comment she usually makes, that she doesn't know much about her mother and father. She says it so matter-of-factly.

My mother was born in Detroit, Michigan, daughter of two immigrants from Galicia, Spain. They had been farmers who had fled during the civil unrest there in the 30's. By the time she was two, she had lost her mother to complications during a gall bladder surgery. Her father, unable to read or write (in English or Spanish) made the decision to send my mother and her infant brother to be raised by relatives.

She apparently cried a lot. Who wouldn't?! In that same matter-of-fact voice, she has told me about her aunt, who put a pillow over her head to quiet her crying once.

She and my uncle ended up in Riverside, California, raised by her father's sister and her husband. I still have fond memories of that person, my great aunt. We always called her Grandma Fernandez. I bragged to my friends that I had extra grandparents! I'll never forget Grandma's arroz con pollo, or her chocolate cake (from scratch) and ice cold milk from a glass jug. Grandma Fernandez was a tough cookie. Every morning she tended her garden faithfully...no easy feat in a town that was carved out of the desert! She also walked everywhere.

I have always wished I knew more about my mother's parents. Apparently I look like my Grandma Gonzales, Anuncia (Nancy).When my Grandpa Gonzales died in the mid 1960's he had been keeping company with a woman who helped him with his reading, writing and day-to-day things. Slowly, this woman had gotten my Grandpa to put his "X" on the deed to his house, bank accounts, etc. Nothing was left when he died, but his yellow trunk. I like to believe that he died not knowing what she had done.

Even though the circumstances behind the arrival of the yellow trunk are sad, I'm so grateful it made its way to us. It is filled with old photos, letters, postcards, etc....all written in Spanish and all reflecting a happier time, decades before Grandpa's death.

My mom, after so much loss and hardship, met the love of her life, my dad, married him in Reno and honeymooned in Vegas. Even my Dad's mom (Lucky 13) said it probably wouldn't last. They had known each other a month! It did last and has passed the 50 year mark. In spite of the tough beginning, Mom is one of the most level-headed, generous-hearted people I know.

When it's all said and done, the memories others have of us are our real legacies.When we nurture those memories by telling the stories, we keep the family tree alive and strong.


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daisybeans wrote on Sun May 10, 2009 5:32 am:

Thank you for sharing your story about your mom and relatives... I love hearing legacy stories... Tell your mom Happy Mother's Day from a Stewbie! I am thinking about my mom a lot this weekend too.

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Green_Numb wrote on Sun May 10, 2009 12:36 pm:

glad you got the trunk with photos, letters and postcards...

you got the memories too so thats priceless..

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Frank wrote on Sun May 10, 2009 12:53 pm:

Well written Lulu, thanks for sharing. It's so great that you got the trunk, those memories are irreplaceable.

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