Doctor Grandma

There’s just no replacing you,

You are with us, always,

in spirit, memory, laughter, hopes.

It is you as a toddler,

you as a child,

teenager, pregnant, young mom and wife.

You raising your boys,

never giving up hope that

they will be just who they are, today,

your faith, your caring,

your forever love,

taking in 2 stepdaughters

as your own,

staying in touch with them

after divorce.

One of them now lives in Georgia,

close to where you were,

how ironic is that? But that’s how life goes.

You in your 40s, finally happy,

secure in yourself and who you are,

I miss you daughter, I miss you here,

your dad and I cope as best we can.

We move through days, one after the other,

carry you with us as we go,

Carry you always, in our hearts,

carry you with us, as we go.

cfblack, 10-10-25

I have this thought for a poem I’ll work on later. It is to speak to poets about why I don’t want to read at a poetry reading. Title may be “I don’t want to read.”

I don’t want to read.

These are the origins of surnames found in my family tree, as of today. I did not know how heavily ENGLISH I was until doing this research, which I’ve been working on for many years, probably nearly 20 years now. This is actual research and not my DNA report. The DNA report is similar, but not this heavily British. What this means is, with having such heavily Western European, particularly ENGLISH heritage, my ancestors settled parts of Jamestown, VA; were one of the first 3 families to settle the area of Connecticut; and lived in Goochland VA, Henrico County VA, and other such places. NO ONE in South Carolina, but all those back into the 1600s in the north also owned slaves and dealt harshly with Native peoples. I will continue to study them, have only touched the surface, really, of those stories.

names

THE WINNER: England: 46     (3- Isle of Wight, VA).  Adams, Alsop, Aylet, Bird, Brigham, Butterworth, Bybee, Cary, Chalfont, Chesebrough, Cox (Cocke), Craddock, Denison, Easum, Edwards, Farrar, Hawkes, Hill, Jacquelin, King, Lorde (from Wikitree!); Marsead, Marshall, Mason, Matthew, Montague, Moore, Perrin, Reynolds, Richardson, Richford, Rushall, Stanton, Stevenson, Strowder, Taylor, Thompson, Towne, Turner, Wade, Walker, Walton, Whitehead.    

2nd place: Scotland:         16                    Agnew, Alexander, Barnett, Bryson, Cardie, Cunningham, Henderson, Henry, Hunter, Lackey, Lemonds, McKean, McKenzie, Mitchell, Reade. 

3rd: Ireland:            15                    Barnett, Beckett, Buchanon, Caldwell, Edminston, Glass, Loftis, Martin, McCann, Phillips, Reid, Riley, Ryan, Seafoam, Thomas.

4th: Germany:          7                    Bruner, Gah, Klinck, Ribelin (Reiblin, Ribley), Shelling, Smith, Sturm

Honorable mention:

Wales:             4                      Owen, Owens, Verch Rhys, Williams  

Sweden           3                      Laicans, Larsdotter, Svensson 

France:            1                    Brashear

Separately, we go to bed,
you 500 miles away,
while summer insects trill and sing,
dogs bark at the night.
It’s 1am, we both will sleep,
tomorrow you come home;
it’s always hard to turn out the light
and go to bed alone.

cfblack, 6-18-2024

Two different families, OWEN and OWENS. With further research, who knows, they may be related, but here is what I found:

Sarah Sally Owen married Thomas Reid. Sarah Sally Owen’s ancestor from Wales, Harry Thomas Owen, came from Llanfyllin, which is in Montgomery County, a mid-section of Wales but still nearer to the northern part than southern. Llanfyllin is the name of a “hundred” which is like a township of that county.

Thomas Reid’s GRANDSON was my great-grandfather, Alexander Reid. Their son, Charles, marries Cora Belle Owens, whose ancestor from Wales was named Owen Thomas Owens, b.1746 in Pentraeth, Wales. Pentraeth is off the NW coast of Wales on a large island of Anglesey.

where the places are:

Pentraeth upper NW:

Llanfyllin, Montgomeryshire is in the upper part of the red county below:

Whenever I die,

unexpectedly or not,

know I am with thee.

Whenever I pass,

Long, or very suddenly,

Know my soul is free.

Tell our family

My love is always with them,

Love is forever.

This life is so short,

the other is eternal,

and so much better.

     cfblack, 1-7-2024

I am going to replace this with a poem later. I’m about to transform from a person in their 60s to a person who is starting her 70s. I cannot even relate to that reality. But that IS my reality.

My 60s have not been kind,

except for the births of 4 of our 8 grandchildren.

At some point in the last decade, my body started talking to me,

and things are just not the same.

In my 60s, I started medication(s),

for various kinds of things,

moderate high blood pressure, and cholesterol,

moderate depression, sciatica,

and the latest– a non-existent cancer scare

that keeps me on another med for half a decade,

a precautionary measure that contributes to advanced aging…

not something I would have chosen at this point in time.

I get my walks in, when it decides not to rain,

a mile or two a day.

I no longer work full-time, but part-time from home,

sitting at my “office” desk in a spare bedroom,

talking to students on Zoom.

to be totally revised and reformed later………………

People ask what I’ll do if I retire.

I always wonder, “Is work all there is for you?”

Once I retire, I am free to go!

Go where the wind blows,

Go where only God knows,

Go to Wisconsin and swim in the lakes,

Go to Pittsburgh and walk the hills,

Go to Raleigh and watch soccer games,

Go to Georgia and see my oldest child jump from a plane!

Free to go where the wind blows,

Free for what only God knows,

but I will be busy, that’s for sure!

Busy seeing grandkids numbering 8,

Busy seeing places I’ve never been,

Busy researching worlds of the past,

our genealogy and DNA,

busy sleeping ’till I want to awake,

taking a nap any time of the day,

Cleaning my house better than before,

having friends over all the more,

Let’s sit by the fire and reminisce,

Watch for the deer and possums to appear,

There’s still plenty of “work” to be done,

friends to have over, battles to be won,

Retiring means the time is yours,

you fill it with things important to you,

you have even MORE wonderful things to do!

to my Baha’i friends:

I have been a Baha’i for 50 years. Recently, I’ve had the realization that oftentimes, I carry stress or tension within myself, unnecessary worry that “I haven’t done enough”. Sometimes Book Ones go forward, sometimes they fail. Sometimes teaching efforts show immediate children’s classes or junior youth groups, sometimes they don’t. My thought is that we put stress upon ourselves. God doesn’t. Baha’u’llah doesn’t. The point is to strive to be a humble servant, strive to share His teachings, each and every day, in some way. You might achieve this in prayer. And be RADIANT. Be HAPPY. “I WANT YOU TO BE HAPPY, … TO LAUGH, SMILE AND REJOICE, IN ORDER THAT OTHERS MAY BE MADE HAPPY BY YOU.”~~ Abdu’l-Baha.

“The Blessed Beauty often remarked: ‘There are 4 qualities which I love to see manifested in people: First, enthusiasm and courage. Second, A FACE WREATHED IN SMILES AND A RADIANT COUNTENANCE. Third, that they may see all things with their own eyes and not through the eyes of others; fourth, the ability to carry a task, once begun, through to its end.”

How often do we convey to our friends and associates this RADIANT countenance? We are only asked to make the effort with courage and enthusiasm, the rest is up to assistance from the Supreme Concourse on high. You are HERE, making the effort. The prayer for parents, which I say every day, has these words, “…for this son (I say daughter because that’s what I am)… “for this daughter hath arisen to render Thee service, and is exerting effort at all times in the pathway of Thy love.”

It doesn’t say “and is creating devotionals, children’s classes, etc….” it says “and is exerting effort in the pathway of Thy love.”