WOW Gal Angel
Florence Meisner
My grandmother on my mother’s side lived a hard life with 8 children (4 boys/4 girls) on a pig farm with a man who loved to torment her in a way he felt was fun. From my own personal memories that could have been more like torment than fun.
There was seldom extra money and my Mom told me how she would repair even her underwear to make them last as long as possible and that they had already lost everything once when there first home burned to the ground.
She had her hands full with the children, especially the boys who were constantly running off with her goodies as fast as she could bake them. For many of her years she had to do her chores without the luxury of running water and only a couple of years before she died, did she have the use of an indoor toilet. While she would chase us out of the kitchen and outside she was kind handing out delicious fresh baked goods and always seemed to appear when we needed her most.
Being so young when she died our memories are limited for sure and it seems only fitting that my older brother who knew her better and died from a heart attack as well at the age of 66 be in the photo chosen for this tribute.It really hit him and my Mom hard when both Grandma and Grandpa died within months of our father.
In her later years she was diagnosed with diabetes eventually losing one of her legs from gangrene making it even harder for her to get around in life. She told herself and family that should she lose the other one she wouldn’t want to be alive. Within days of her finding out that she would indeed need to have her other leg removed she died of a heart attack.
She was born in January and died in January at the age of 62. I like to think of her, my mother and my brother (and all her children except one) dancing the jig together up in heaven. She appears to be lighter and brighter than she ever was on earth. Happy to have the family together again she truly glows!
Things we remember about the farm was the huge ants and pigs that seemed to be roaming about the yard. My sister came upon a rat my brother told her was a cat she should pet an thankfully Grandma came to her rescue when that didn’t work out well. Then inside memories of lobsters roaming the kitchen floor before being collected and put into the pots of boiling water. Never a dull moment when we visited. As the youngest it felt like a scary place to me with my Grandma being the only comfortable arms.
Love YOU Grandma!
Contributed by Granddaughters & WOW Gals Carolyn Shannon & Pat Hutchinson