Mamaw

There is so much to say...and so little of it can be put into words. Some you have already been told. That she was the shy daughter of a Baptist preacher who married the fast young man that her parents disapproved of her marrying. That she loved her God with a passion that few people can comprehend. She married twice but loved only once, choosing companionship in her later years with a man who was, in my opinion, never good enough for her. Now I know that there are cousins who were too young to know or remember our Papaw. And some of them call Frank Martin by that precious name. I'd like to go on the record here and now and say that if you are one of those cousins and read this, don't be offended. You are entitled to your opinion of Frank Martin, and I am entitled to mine. Like Ouiser Boudreaux, I can be pleasant. I even smiled at the man a time or two. That changes nothing. Least of all the simple fact the on his best day he was only about a quarter of the man my Papaw was on his worse day.

My grandmother was the paragon of patience. When I was a little girl she drank grapefruit juice. Wanting to be like her, I asked for a glass of grapefruit juice of my own, only to promptly go to the sink and pour half of it down the drain then fill the half glass of juice with water and drink the watered down juice. Which raises the question...why didn't she or someone else stop me? When I asked her years later, she told me she just didn't want to take away my sense of being pleased with myself
when I watered down my juice by myself.

Her favorite bird was a cardinal. She sat pie pans of birdseed in the snow and show me how to watch quietly when the beautiful male cardinals braved the threat of Papaw's old tom cat Tom to feed. She also liked violets. When she was in Florida, I tried to find a way to mail violets to her from our backyard. When she lived with us I would bring them to here whenever I could.