A Legacy of Love - Granny Barbara

Well, friends, when we parted ways last week I could not have predicted how the weekend would go.  Our family suffered a great loss.  On Saturday, my mother-in-law suddenly passed away. We have spent the last few days saying tearful goodbyes, remembering funny stories and basically just being together.  Today I want to share a little bit about the lady who gave me my husband, loved my children and so very much more

Granny Barbara spent her life servicing others.  Not only was it her career, it was her heart, her natural go to, her default character trait.  Over the last week, person after person has called, shown up at the house or sent an email or text to simply say......she did this for me.....she always made sure I had.....she was like a mom to me.  So there are countless stories I could tell but I want to share this one with you that I think completely sums up the wonderful woman she was.

When Hurricane Katrina hit many college students were displaced.  I got a phone call from a friend who knew of a family who was desperately looking for help for their child.  After being displaced from her college this child made her way to Mobile, but the airlines were not flying in or out.  So basically this kid was stuck in a town where she did not know anyone and had no place to stay for the night.  The call I got said "don't you all have family in Mobile?".  I said - yes we did.  They asked if I thought they would be willing to take in a kid for the night.  My response was - absolutely, no one does this better than my mother-in-law.  I called her up.  She retrieved the child, fed her, bedded her down for the night and got her to her flight the next day.  Easy peasy.  No worries.

While many of us may have stretched out of our comfort zone and done this because it needed to be done, I am not sure we would have had the same affect.  Here is how I KNOW this went down.  The rest of the family came home that night, saw a stranger in the living room and asked who is that. My mother-in-law would have responded "oh someone who needed help tonight".........and that was that.  You see her kids, her grandkids, even a neighbor stopping by would not have batted an eye at the fact someone none of them knew was being taken in and cared for.  No one searched on Facebook or Instagram to make sure the stranger was sane and safe.  No one chastised my mother-in-law for opening their home.  No, none of this happened because this is their norm.  Someone needs help, ok let's do it.  Someone needs a place to stay, ok let's do it.  This woman lived her life so effortlessly giving that not a single soul would have blinked an eye about this.

Can you imagine being such a giver that everyone who knows you feels totally normal in a situation like this?

Can you imagine raising kids and grandkids who think this is the rule not the exception?

It is who she was. Plain and simple.

So we now have a responsibility to carry on this legacy......to love......to do it effortlessly.

We will do our best to make her proud.