Five Minute Friday: Roots

Lisa-Jo Baker (lisajobaker.com) hosts a weekly event on her blog called "Five Minute Friday". The rules are

1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking.
2. Link back here and invite others to join in.
3. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is, like, the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community..

So here's my first try at this. Today's topic was Roots.

Roots – I think about my grandparents who lived on a farm until my grandfather’s diabetes worsened and they moved to a town with a hospital nearby. My father still says he wished he could have kept that farm. I think of my grandmother who was a widow for 20 years. Every year she would stand over my PaPa’s grave, wishing she was with him.

I think of my parents, a product of those grandparents, how hard my father worked to put 2 girls through college without us having to take out a single loan. My mother who helped him with his moonlighting jobs by collating the thesis and dissertations that he printed at night. I hope that I make them proud.

Sometimes I’m afraid that those roots will end because I don’t have children. Who will carry on the memory of the farmhouse, the one that had the cat who ran away because I always pulled its tail and the chickens I gave pep talks to so that they’d lay more eggs.

That’s why I must write, to tell those stories, of hardworking parents across the generations who made me who I am today. So that their stories and my stories will live on in others, even if they aren’t related to me or my roots. I must put down my own roots and leave a legacy. These people were too good to be forgotten.