Matriarch

On November 9^th 2016 your Great Grandmother Dolores Caroline Prindiville passed away. She was my last remaining Grandparent on this earth, she was a matriarch in every sense of the word, and many will miss her.     

Grandma lived 93 years, she was born in 1923. When she was born the use of electricity in homes was not widespread, the second world war had not begun, she could not vote, black people in America had almost no equality, and the great depression was only a few short years away. She began her life only 93 years ago, and yet at the end almost everything that “was”, “is”, no longer. 93 years, most never will see that many days, that many hours. At times life reminds me of a line for JRR Tolkien, “the young perish and the old linger”, however, your Great Grandmother did not do much lingering.

I have come to a moment in my life that has puzzled me somewhat. I have accomplished as much as I dreamt when I was young, and I am living a reality that was once only a desire of my heart. I completed school, married a beautiful woman, fathered children, traveled the world, and have a fulfilling and challenging career. I often say that I am already too old to die young, yet if I make it to your Great Grandmothers age I still have two lifetimes ahead of me at the moment of this writing.

I would caution you this about time, it is easy to subtract from it, impossible to add to it, and that the greater quantity is not indicative of a greater quality. At some point you will begin to dictate what happens in your life, and your path through it. You can choose to believe you are a victim of the world and helpless in your fate, or you can decide no one other than you is responsible for your life, and take charge of it. Every moment you spend cannot be reclaimed, but that does not mean that all lazy days are wasted time. When you look at something as vast as 93 years with a microscope, moments, even months can seem mundane, but when you look at years the true nature of a life takes form.

Your Great Grandmother endured hardships that I feel would crush people of my time. She was raised going without comforts that we take for granted daily. When she became a woman she married and had 8 children, when those children were grown she gained an education as a nurse and began to care for strangers instead of her offspring. When she had diligently saved she traveled the world, from adventures in the Amazon rain forest, to China and a lot of places in between. She lived many lives during her 93 years, she gave birth to what would become generations and generations of lives, and at the end she quietly slipped from this world, unknown to the masses, but loved by many. How will you measure a life well lived? When you look to your Matriarch I hope you will agree she did well. 

France

Your mother and I recently took a vacation, our last hurrah before your sister Quinn gets here, and also to celebrate mom’s 30^th birthday. We traveled to France for 10 days. We spent the first 4 nights in Paris, touring the sights, sounds, tastes of the city. We moved onto Versailles for one night in the Waldorf Astoria…. And I spend a months worth of grocery bills on a single meal! Lastly our favorite 3 nights we spent in the Loire Valley touring the countryside and Chateau’s of the region. One of my great joys in life is traveling with your mother, going on adventures and getting away from the harried pace of daily life.

During our stay in Paris we made a day trip out to the beaches of Normandy, where on June 6^th 1944 the Allied forces landed to begin the liberation of Europe from Nazi Germany. I almost decided not to make the trip, it was quite a drive from Paris and I didn’t know if we would have the time. I am so glad we made the journey though. We visited the battlefields and saw where men battled and lost their lives, we saw what havoc mankind is capable of, and what heroism in the face of death they are capable of.

By far the most moving moments were the visiting of the graveyards. The American cemetery sits above the ocean, all of the plants are from America, and all the graves face west, towards the home those men would never return to. The knowledge that these men died for their convictions, to set strangers free and prevent further human suffering overwhelmed me. I found myself welling up with emotion over men I did not know, but men I nevertheless owed a debit to. One of the inscriptions that moved me was “These endured all and gave all that justice among nations might prevail and that mankind might enjoy freedom and inherit peace.”  

One other note on something I did not expect. During our visit to Normandy we were taken to the German cemetery. I had not anticipated, nor really did I have any desire to see it however, I came away moved nonetheless. One particularly moving inscription that I found put the cemetery and the men who were interred there into perspective. “Until 1947, this was an American cemetery. The remains were exhumed and shipped to the United States. It has been German since 1948, and contains over 21,000 graves. With its melancholy rigor, it is a graveyard for soldiers not all of whom had chosen either the cause or the fight. They too have found rest in our soil of France.”

Wars end, the fire of hatred can grow to an inferno, but eventually every inferno runs out of things to consume. I believe that was the case with the German cemetery and world war II. The hard-won piece that followed was one in which nearly every person on the earth had been touched by the war, and they were weary from the toll it exacted from their souls. There was understanding by soldiers that the men they faced were, for the most part, men like them, under orders as they were, fighting for their country. Graveyards are moving places, after the endless injustices and tragedies of war forgiveness is an incredible thing, and really the only thing that can bring true peace.

There were many more moments from our trip I will remember forever. Touring beautiful gardens and castles, eating exquisite meals and watching the sunset over the Loire river with your mother. One picture which I will always remember is standing in a field of yellow flowers with your mother. It stretched to the horizon so there was only yellow meeting the blue of the sky, the air was cool but not cold, and a breeze was moving softly enough the make it feel as though there were waves and the flowers were the ocean. When some moments of difficulty find me I will go back to that place, I will see your mother standing there with another of our children in her. I will feel that cool air and I will remember how vivid the colors were in that moment and nothing else will matter.

I love you both so much, I look forward to having you with us for some of our adventures, and to the day you grow to be old enough to embark on your own.

Lineage

I believe that someday you will find, as I have, that looking ahead to the events of life makes time seem abundant and elastic. However, looking behind at the course of your life will render time brief and all to quickly dissipated. On January 10^th your Great Grandmother Anne Harding slipped from her earthly life to her eternal one, she went to join her husband Russell, who passed away before either of you were born. I felt grief as now this world is without her, but I felt joy as well, because I was able to say goodbye, because she had lived a long and blessed life, and mostly because I know without doubt she is with my Grandfather, and our Lord.

Your Great Grandmother was born in Michigan, to parents from Germany and Austria. I was told her mother married around 15 years of age, her father worked the land as a farmer. She spoke fondly of parts of her childhood, many times of a German Shepheard that was her constant companion. She met her husband on a train, I don’t know where she was going but he was on his way to the Pacific theater to take part in World War II. I know he asked to sit next to her, to which she replied “no”, not deterred he asked to write her while he was away, and he did, for 3 years. When he returned they were married, and they never separated again.

I found during the funeral that Anne fell in love with the west during a visit here, and quickly convinced my Grandfather to re-locate the family. I am not sure that he ever said no to her. I also learned that she was responsible for your Grandfathers side of the family coming to know the Lord, and eventually my father leading me to the Lord. I was struck by the way her decisions had shaped my life in ways I only now am realizing the weight of.

So often in the age in which I live the focus is on the present, the immediacy of our needs and satiation of our desires. We give little thought to the notion that we are leading not only our lives, but the generations that will follow down the roads we are choosing. If I plan and act poorly you and your children’s children may suffer for it. If I act wisely and prudently generations may flourish long after I am gone. Men and women work to leave legacies in stone and steel, and yet the greatest one we will have will not be lifeless and stationary, but living breathing testaments to our time on earth.

In the final week of my Grandmas life I sat by her bedside. She was frail, but still understood what was going on. She told me she was tired, and she was ready to go to heaven. I recalled memories of my childhood with her, recalling all the great days we had spent, and how she had shaped my life. I reassured her of my love, of how proud I was of her, and how great of a grandmother she had been to me. She was proud of me as well, of my life and of the family I have. I am so happy she got to meet and love both of you. I asked her if she had slept well, and had any good dreams. She told me she had dreamt she was with her husband Russell, who died 12 years before, and that she did not want to wake up from that dream. I believe on the night she left us he was there to bring her home.

I will love each of you my entire life, my love for you requires not effort, it flows from me and through me. Not all love is like that, my love for your mother requires work, requires me to let go of my selfish desires, to lay my life down for her- her love for me most assuredly requires a great deal more.  One thing my Grandparents taught me, and that always made me proud of them, was that two people can love one another their entire lives. They can cease to exist singularly; I cannot think of one of them without the other. I hope someday you will see your mother and I in that light, that I will leave that example for you to follow if nothing else. Life is only worth living because of love, Gods Love, and your love for others. Without Love life has no meaning, no purpose, no redemption.

I see my Grandmother still. I feel her comfort climbing into a warm cabin bed early in the morning to cuddle, I taste the meals she worked so hard on for others to enjoy, I hear her voice longing to know of my life and encouraging me, I see her and my Grandfather embracing and calling to each other. Your lineage is up to you, dependent on the choices you make and the responsibilities you decide to shoulder or shirk. You have the strength of generations behind you, and in your blood flowing through you. Remember you do not walk alone, and that the roads you choose you will be choosing for others you may never live to know.

I love you both so much. I have been traveling for work all week long, and cant wait to be home!