Who Is She?

 I know the photo is a little fuzzy, but you know technology doesn't always do what we want it to.  A lot like me as a child I didn't always do what "she" told me to and many years later I paid for it.  One thing I remember about this lady is that she said, "Make sure your handbag and your shoes match".  What for, who cares I thought, until you take a photo... She would tell me in my youth, "you don't have to be available every time time the phone rings."  I thought to myself, she has got be crazy, don't she know that THE most desirable "boy" from school is going to call me?!  It was years and I mean years later when I found my voice to say no, I don't have to accept the first set of rims that offers me an opportunity of life filled with unknown garbage.  I would often open the refrigerator door and peruse the contents until I visually saw something that would complement my appetite.  There she goes again yelling about something/anything, "Will you stop holding that door open".  One day she said "How many times do I have to tell you?"  I thought to myself and then I said it --- outloud, "I don't know".  To my sheer horror I realized what I had done, I still have my original teeth.

This woman you see in the photo is not your average woman, she comes from a place in time very different from when I grew up, yet her teachings were just as valid in her day as they were in mine.  Let's be clear, she wasn't that warm and fuzzy person she is today making "cheeseburger pies" for her grandson or enjoying the dollar store with her granddaughter.  Oh no, that woman was a force to be reckoned with.  She had seen some hard times (not like today - we can't get that $150 weave until next week), she had walked the road with some less than savory folk and survived (you know what I'm talkin' bout).  She held on in spite of popular demand that said "Run Forest, Run, Run and don't look back, get out while you can!!!), she held on to the ideology that her children must come first.  She SACRIFICED as He did, she was bruised and troubled but here she is today smiling.

So if you see her, you thank God for her, I do...

Who Is She, She is My Mother - Nettie Williamson, Happy Birthday!!