Born in the northeast, I am from the city. I am from west side, east side, and downtown Cleveland, Ohio. I am from lake view picnic spots, and crazy fun, summer amusement park days. I am from neighborhood park swings where on many occasions throughout my teen years, I sat alone thinking and dreaming. I am from one parent of strong will with an unfathomable determination to stop living the life of a serious alcoholic some 46 years ago. I use the term unfathomable here because there were so many negatives in the man's life, that he was unwilling to change. His determination to change a major thing in his life is amazing to me. I am from the city streets he traveled.
I am from another parent of pure heart and deep values; a woman whose "soldier on" attitudes gave her surviving strength at times when all was lost; a woman whose choices were not always best for her own life; however, she never forced her paths on other souls. She maintained the common decency to allow others she loved to live their own lives by the choices they had made. I am from this woman who knows that our characters are reflected best by the way we treat each other.
I am from a Sicilian grandfather who traveled to the United States from Sicily with his family by boat, at age 4. I am from a loopy, wonderful Dutch grandmother who deemed that all bath soap and bed linens should be white. She was a woman whose grandmother raised her; a woman who longed for love and affection all of her life, and one who was happiest when she was caring for others. I am from my paternal grandparents' suburban neighborhood.
I am one of 7 siblings who share the same biological father. I am from an old suburban Jr. high school where I spent my 7th grade year. I am from fancy restaurants which offered expensive gourmet meals. I am from backyard parties and company cookouts, shopping plazas, and swimming pools on the tops of sky high apartment buildings. I am from Christmas lights adorning public square, and people passing by one another on each city block. I am from many memories of age-old museums of art, history, and science; and many memories of an age-old zoo of animals, who come from various places in the world.
I am from very old mountains. I am from coalfields, mining camp houses, and whistle posts. I am from a town where church chimes rang on Sunday mornings echoing through the hills before services. I am from a 2-story, painted white, wooden schoolhouse on a hill. I am from the Dick and Jane reading series, and teachers who took time to really know their students. I am from "home-cooked" school cafeteria lunches. I am from country stores with pop machines containing glass-bottled pop. I am from the days of penny candy, homemade milkshakes, and snow ice cream. I am from scrumptious country cooking.
I am from coal miners who worked in and up hollows, and seemingly God- forsaken dark tunnels, to make a living for their families. I am from railroad tracks where trains traveled through the middle of our large county, hauling connected cars filled to their brims with glossy chunks of rich black rocks of coal. I am from coal furnaces that needed tending throughout each day of winter, and window fans that cooled the camp houses every day and night of summer. I am from slamming screen doors, and the echoes of the voices of aunts and uncles and grandparents, telling my cousins and myself to stop running in and out of the house. I am from the ancient wisdom of the people of the old mountains.
I am from a grandfather who worked the dark mines as a youngster, for mere pennies a day, and began serving his country at age 17, at the end of World War 1. I am from a family of men who served in the United States Navy. I am from a grandmother who raised her children on a miner's pay; purchasing food for her family at the company store with miner's script, for a time. Purchases were made "on credit", when American dollars replaced the script that was used in the coalfields. I am from this woman who washed her children's homemade clothes on a washboard until the old washboard was replaced by the wringer washer that sat in the middle of the kitchen floor on the day designated as, "washday". She was a woman whose faith in her God sustained her throughout her life; a woman who as a youngster, suffered and survived the pain of rheumatoid arthritis, continued on to raise her children and serve her neighbors in every way she could. She was a woman akin to angels, always putting the needs and dreams of others before her own. With courage and love, in the middle-ages of their lives, my maternal grandparents of the coalfields, gave me the same good fortune as their own children were given-- to be "home" with them.
I am from springtime evenings on front porch gliders; lemonade stands; backyard wiener and marshmallow roasts; and banana seat bicycles. I am from mud puddles in the middle of dirt roads; and mud pies; and #2 washtubs used to bathe; for washing coal dirt from a child's dirty face and feet after a day of outside adventure. I am from neighbors of goodwill who shared fresh garden foods in summer, and large portions of pinto beans or stews in winter. I am from a people who would surround one another in times of crisis, such as illness or death.
I am from the city and the country. I am from old and young. I am from people who are and were strong, and though not always fortunate, were rich in ways untold. I am also from people who were fortunate enough to have finer things in life. I am a small slice of pie; a tiny grain of sand; an integral part of all of these.
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