BOOMER GRANDMA CHANNELS GREAT GRANDMA EFFORTLESSLY

Boomer Grandma comes from a generation given the dubious credit of being the first totally self-absorbed demographic in American history.

It’s quite a label to carry, but Boomer Grandma proves it wrong. Aren’t grandparents even allowed a little self-absorption? Boomer, please.

Now Boomer Grandma carries an even heavier burden, if that’s possible. They are the connecting link to the Grandma’s of the last two centuries.

Yes, they are, and here’s why (if you haven’t figured it out):

For easy math, a sixty year old woman today was born in 1960. Her mom could have been born in 1930.

See where I’m going here? Depression children as parents.

Boomer Grandma’s grandma could have been born in 1899. Now, I’m a fan of turn of the century American history, the pre-WWI era. A haunting book of the time is Goodbye To All That by Robert Graves.

The huge changes in the new auto industry and road building and airplanes had to be difficult for the great grandma’s raising baby grandmas. Which brings us to:

My Grandma

Click this link for background on Boomer Grandma’s Grandma, from here forward known as Grandma.

First, let’s get clear on the grandma tree. I’m referring to the turn of the century kid when I say My Grandma, not the Depression born kid.

My Grandma was a big, beautiful, Texan and whip smart. I’ve read her valedictorian speech. Her academic achievement won a full scholarship to SMU, according to family legend. She started her freshman year in September, 1929.

In October the economy crashed to start the Great Depression, and Grandma dropped out of college, got married, and had my momma. The family of three became the family of two when Grandma decided she’d rather be a single mom in the 1930’s than married.

Grandma Stood Her Ground

Grandma poured punch at a 1942 USO dance in Dallas. That’s where she met Grandpa. You know the story:

Some enchanted evening, you may see a stranger,
You may see a stranger across a crowded room,
And somehow you know, you know even then,
That somehow you’ll see her again and again.

Some enchanted evening, someone may be laughing,
You may hear her laughing across a crowded room,
And night after night, as strange as it seems,
The sound of her laughter will sing in your dreams.

Who can explain it, who can tell you why?
Fools give you reasons, wise men never try.

They met, got married, and a week later Grandpa shipped out to the War in the Pacific for the next two years. Grandma took her little girl from the familiar surroundings of Dallas, Texas to the John Steinbeck-ish sounding Orofino, Idaho and waited out the war with her mother in law.

She was a bookkeeper and whirlwind, a big city girl with big ideas on what’s wrong and how to fix things by the time Grandpa got home from the war. Together they migrated with the timber industry to a then tiny Bend, Oregon.

Grandpa cut trees so well that he taught college classes on the skill. He’d been in the woods before chainsaws and missed the pace of human power on a misery whip. Grandma was a professional woman pushing for other women.

Boomer Grandma Is The Connection

Who better to pass down the wisdom of age than a Grandma. My Grandma set the wisdom bar higher than most and seemed disappointed when others didn’t reach it.

When boomers were young they had the educational chance of meeting Great Grandmas. How far back to they go? Mine was ninety six and came from an era where they didn’t wash their hair but once a year for fear of catching a cold. That was the story she told. It made sense then.

With a Granddaughter due any second, my hope is that Boomer Grandma passes down the best we have to offer, and that Millennial Moms are patient. After all, only a mother knows another mother best. Right?

I am out. Remember to VOTE.

Now I’m out.