By Lin Floyd

What can we learn from our grandparents, those special people in our lives who love so unconditionally? What makes a grandpa or a grandma so cherished? One major thing––mine always made time for us during our visits. As they interacted with us, we observed their lives and learned from their examples.

I remember my grandpa’s tan face and white forehead, the result of years of working outside on the railroad gang inspecting and repairing the Union Pacific railroad tracks between Los Angeles and Salt Lake City. He could be called out any time, day or night, in all kinds of weather to fix the tracks or to clean up a train derailment.

His duties and responsibilities at home also kept him busy. As a hunter, he supplied most of the meat they ate as a family. He loved to hunt and fish and taught me how to fish, and to thread a worm on a hook.

Always busy, Grandpa was the gardener, the farmer raising chickens and eggs, the car mechanic, and overall fix-it man. The traits he exemplified to me were the importance of hard work and thrift.

Grandpa was careful about always saving a little for a rainy day. He kept his money in a bank until he
had enough to buy a new car or any other expensive purchase, then paid cash for everything. Can you imagine us doing that today? He lived frugally by the pioneer motto: use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.

The last time I saw Grandpa, he’d retired from the railroad. Hunting was impossible for him because of heart problems that developed. I didn’t know as I sat next to him, smiling and listening to the same old hunting and fishing stories I had heard through the years, that this would be our last visit.

After his funeral, I decided to write his life history so that someday when my children or grandchildren are curious about their heritage, they can come to know my grandpa and the qualities he taught me through his quiet example.

Grandmas are always special to their grandkids for many reasons. My grandmother was a great example to me of a self-sufficient, hard-working homemaker. Every spring, she would do a major spring cleaning. I do mean major, because her home was heated with coal. After a year of cooking and heating on her coal stove, her walls were dingy. She couldn’t wait to wash down those walls, repaint them, take down the dirty curtains and put up fresh starched ones.

Of course the windows needed washing, the floors scrubbing, and the stovepipe had to be taken down, cleaned and shined. It was very labor intensive. I’m sure Grandpa winced at the thought of all that work when the temperatures started to warm but he knew keeping Grandma happy was very important. She was the heart of the home. Without her, nothing happened: no laundry, no ironing, no cooking, no canning, no sewing or mending.

How did she do it all? She worked non-stop. Just getting the fruit bottled during the summer and fall was exhausting work in a hot kitchen. There was always more fruit maturing. Much of it she got free from her own trees, neighbor’s trees or wild fruit trees. Her canned fruit was a work of art with its carefully peeled pears artfully placed in the bottle with a slice of orange in the bottom. Her pantry had to be filled during the warm days to prepare for the long winter when fresh fruit was unavailable to buy.

I loved eating her bottled peaches, cherries and pears. She also made fresh homemade bread and delicious fluffy rolls that were legendary. Visiting her, one was sure to put on some pounds as Grandma delighted in seeing you finish off her rolls with melted butter and fresh homemade jam.

In those days, every-thing was made at home. Grandma even made her own house dresses and aprons on her treadle sewing machine, an amazing machine that didn’t need electricity. You used your feet to push the treadle up and down to move the machine needle to make stitches. Grandma practiced recycling, meaning nothing was wasted. She made my first baby clothes as I was her first grandchild.
Did she spoil me? Probably, but that made her more special to me.

My grandparents always made me feel welcome during my visits with them. We’d sit on the porch at night and talk while eating peeled apples. My busy grandmother always had time after the chores were done to put together jigsaw puzzles with me. She left me a quilt top made of scraps of old dresses and aprons which I lovingly quilted, remembering her love for me with every stitch.