Things overlooked

Willie Mae Foreman and Miriam Jeannine

This photo is from 85 years ago. There are several important historical features of this photo that if my family decided to make it public would be very lucrative. I'm not a fan of that proposition. I'd hate this picture to end up on the wall at a Cracker Barrel restaurant. It holds too much emotional meaning for me. The picture is of my grandmother holding my mother in what was probably the first photo ever taken of my mother. The picture was taken in late 1927 or early 1928. My mother was born seven days before Black Tuesday, recognized as the beginning of the great recession. My grandmother was 22 at the time. From the bob of her hair, you can tell that she tended more toward the fashionable side and was probably considered a flapper during the roaring 20's. If the piano could have been recorded in Gadsden, AL at the time, the music in the back ground would have been played by her. The fur collar and cuffs of her attire spoke to the social status that she held before the blight of the depression. My mother did not remember that affluence. The dress that my mother was wearing was probably designed, cut and sewed on a singer sewing machine by either my grandmother or her mother. I have that machine sitting in my living room now. I rarely give it the love it deserves. The rather stiff stockings that my mother is wearing were probably made by my grandmother. She used to tell me how she was taught to knit so she could knit stockings for the soldiers fighting in Europe in WW1. All of these things lend to the monetary value of the photograph...but there is more.

Reflecting on this photo tonight, my grandmother told me herself that she was not beautiful. But looking at the picture I have to disagree. According to the standards of her time, she may have been considered pretty. I think that she only looked at the negative side of her features. The amazing parts of them are the high defined cheek bones and the intensity of her gaze. I may be prejudiced, but I think my grandmother was beautiful. I know that my mother was. She was a classic beauty wearing clothes that were crafted on that same singer sewing machine. You know, I couldn't bring myself to sell that thing even if it was the difference between shelter and going homeless. It is just too much a part of who I am.

I have been baffled by descriptives of me all my life, regularly embarrassed by them. I heard all too often that I have the Calvert blue eyes. It has only been recently that I understood what that meant. Most blue eyes change according to the color of their environment. They range from intense blue when the person is wearing a blue tone to grey with neutral tones. Calvert eyes don't have that range of change. They do come more or less intense, but it ranges from dark blue to sky blue as the color of clothing that is worn changes. If I am wearing a deep blue, my eyes will reflect it. If I am wearing a grey shirt, my eyes will be sky blue. The color unnerves people. People mention it to me frequently. My family calls it Calvert blue. I thought it was just with my family. But I have learned in genealogy circles that the term is valid. There is the term "Calvert blue" The second descriptive that I have ever gotten of my eyes, and I have gotten this one often from a variety of different places is "You look as though you are seeing into someone else's soul." That one has always freaked me out.  It isn't someone who is hitting on me, and it isn't given in a bar setting. My eye color and my gaze make some people uncomfortable.  It doesn't happen often, but when it does, I wonder what I am doing that makes them say that. Looking at this picture I see that quality in my grandmother. I think it may be something that is inherited.

The thing that I didn't overlook as I was reflecting on this picture is that it was taken at the beginning of two lives that took twists and turns that no one would have imagined. It wasn't always a rosy adventure, they faced hard times and terrible traumas. But they were strong enough to build good homes and families who loved them. I miss both of them especially today.  I would have loved to pin a red rose to my lapel and sit on the family pew at the presbyterian church listening to my grandmother playing "In the garden" on the organ. To go have a family lunch of fried chicken or pot roast with all the adults crammed around the dinning table and the kids around the kitchen table and island. I miss that. I know that it will happen again on the other side. But for now, it is a very fond memory.