Abuelita

“Remember how the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness these forty years, to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart.” ~ Deuteronomy 8:2

The greatest inspiration in my life was an eighty-nine pound woman who never learned to drive.  Every day she made her coffee at 2:55pm, always Folgers instant crystals, always served with her favorite “galletas,” the crackers she snacked on while watching “Guiding Light” on CBS.  When I walked in the door she would immediately hand me my own cup of coffee and catch me up on the first ten minutes of the show that I had missed during my walk home from school.

My grandma’s sparse closet housed a handful of dresses that were gifts from my mom and an assortment of hand-me-down items collected from friends and neighbors. She had one gold necklace that read “#1 Mom,” which she wore only to church on Sundays. Grandma slept without a pillow and kept only one thin comforter on her bed in any given season. By earthly standards she had very little but her own standards were from the heavens so she wanted for nothing.

Early on I learned about the wilderness that my grandmother had traveled through. About my alcoholic grandfather, the abuse.  The pain. I watched her quietly and faithfully care for him through the years that he was ill and dying.  Yet when I think of her all I can see are her slippers so carefully set at her bedside as she knelt to pray several times a day.  I hear her prayers uttered in Spanish and the songs of praise she sang as she washed the dishes.  I feel the legacy of faith that goes before me and holds me up, far greater than any inheritance ever could.

Though she’s been gone for almost twenty years, my grandmother’s heart after the Lord continues to urge me to humility and truth.  I want my son to be able to say of me that what came out of my life is a true reflection of what was in my heart.