Family Legacy

There I was, sitting on the front pew and all I could think about was the last words she whispered to me in my ear at the hospital. She had been sick a long time, she was tired, the chemo had just about worn her completely down and I was glad she was no longer in pain. As I glanced at all the flowers, the beautiful arrangements clustered about the church, I couldn’t help but think she would have loved them all, especially the beautiful white roses. Those were her favorite and those were the last bunch I brought to her in the hospital. Then my mind went to the room. Her voice was weak and low but I remembered she summoned me to put my ear to her mouth. She whispered these words in my ear, “Look under the sewing kit in the Hope chest. I’ve had it for years and I want you to take possession of it now. It was given to me by my mother and I was saving it for you.” I couldn’t help but remember how her hand grabbed mine and although very frail and weak, she clutched my hand like she knew it was the last time she would. So many things, so many memories flooded my mind while I sat there, I never heard the Director ask the family to stand. It was hard to keep the tears at bay, but as I followed the casket out of the church and to the hearse, I knew it was my turn to say goodbye.

Back at the house, as the family gathered, I glanced around at the pictures on the wall, childhood memories that were etched in my head. The walls started speaking to me as I went from room to room. I closed my eyes and heard her voice in my mind, calling me inside when it got dark, waking me up in the morning to do chores, each room filled with its own distinct snippet of a memory like a video playing in my head. Soon the people started to trickle out of the house and I was left to bear the memories and silence alone. The calls started to wean off and I tried to just settle down and clear the clutter inside my heart. She’s gone, now I’m on my own in the quiet of the room, just there with my thoughts. I began to linger on the conversation we had, the one at the hospital where she gave me the instructions. What was it she had treasured all these years that only I was to set eyes on?

The Hope chest was a family heirloom and had been handed down for generations since our ancestors had built it while on the plantation. It was given as the ultimate wedding present from mother to daughter and she told me as a young girl it would become mine when I married. That never happened in her lifetime. So now I had the assignment of being able to gather all the things that was in there. It smelled like old pine, it was solid, heavy, and smooth. Probably crafted by one of the males in my family and I longed to know how many people of our family actually touched it at some point in their life. She took great pride in this chest and although it was as sturdy as it was old, she never let it be moved from its original resting spot in her room, not even to clean it. I opened the chest lid, with its iron hinges that creaked as the lid went up. The first item seen was the most beautiful hand sewn quilt, a visual representation of my family tree while on the plantation and shortly after Emancipation. It had the most exquisite color scheme I had ever seen and each square block was a reference to a family member that had helped sew the quilt. She treasured that quilt so much along with the stories told about each block it contained. I used to love sitting at her feet, listening to the family history and as she talked my eyes grew wider with excitement while my brain grew wiser with knowledge. Priceless moments like those would haunt me now, as she was no longer here to share those stories. I slowly, yet carefully picked up the quilt and placed it on the end of the bed. The sewing kit I remembered seeing her use so often was settled on top of some other unrecognizable items. After I pulled out the sewing kit, I managed to dig out some handmade lace doilies, aged white gloves, possibly from a wedding, a gilded jewelry box that contained a strand of pearls, and some old newspaper clippings about various historical events from Dr. King’s assassination to the Challenger space shuttle exploding. Down at the very bottom of the chest was an item wrapped in a brown tattered towel. I reached down to get it and pull it out. As I unwrapped the towel, a small black notebook dropped out onto the chest bottom. I picked it up and felt its cover. Smooth black leather that was bound at the spine, pages yellow from age and inside there were written pages. Some of the pages had words, some had recipes, and some had mathematical equations and numbers. She was not an educated woman by today’s standards, so I was baffled by the equations. I started to look at the recipes and they were extremely familiar. I realized it was her secret pie recipes, the ones she had learned from her mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. I searched my memory banks to recall a time I had ever seen her use any recipes and I could think of none. She had baked pies since I was a very small child and never once did I see so much as a book or piece of paper in that kitchen while she baked. Every single pinch or cup was done from memory, so this perplexed me. As I continued to rifle through this notebook, the equations became increasingly larger throughout the book. I started to gather that this was her way of a makeshift bookkeeping system for her pie-baking business. This was the only logical reason I could find for this little black notebook, the keeper of her secrets.

I continued to unwrap the towel and found an extremely worn book. There were no letters or words on this book but one could tell it had been used a very long time by the feel of its covers. I opened it to investigate and found it was a family bible. The pages were worn, fragile, and crumbly and as I examined the pages I noticed there were spots in this book that seemed elevated. I turned the pages very slowly and there was the first one, a set of flat twenty dollar bills bound together by a paper clip. There were 5 in all and I set them aside. I continued to look through the pages to find two hundred dollar bills stuck in the bind. As I thumbed through the bible gently I realized there was money hidden within this bible, lots of it. Some amounts were in small bills, some in larger bills. I took my time and searched through until I had gone from cover to cover, retrieving various amounts of money, totaling $20,000. I sat there in amazement, astonishment, surprise, and excitement all at once. Not only was there money, but an envelope with a letter, addressed to me, dated February 13th, 1970. There was a small message saying, “To my girl, you will endure many things in your life, but you will be a warrior, tenacious, strong-willed, courageous, and determined. I will spend the rest of my life saving for you, as my ancestors before me, because you are the chosen one, the one who will go further than any other, the hope of the ancestors, the one our legacy depends on. This money will ensure that what you put your hands to do will succeed and I will be proud.” I never would have thought she even made this much money. I grabbed the black notebook and looked again very carefully at the entries made. The entries were made by various ancestors of our family down through the generations. Long before I was even thought of, the decision was made for someone to be successful. Each year the owner of the bible would put money in the pages for saving, and this tradition continued on throughout the years with each owner of the bible and the black notebook. Not to mention the value of the items in the Hope chest that had come from the rich history of my family. As I sat in tears, I was utterly speechless. Never could I have imagined my family had such a rich legacy as this. The priceless heirlooms, the money, the bible and especially the black notebook. This was more than my heart could take at this moment. I flooded the floor with my tears, tears of joy, tears of pain, all of the tears I held at the funeral, it all came gushing out and it was at that moment, I truly missed yet greatly loved her more than words could express.

That night I could not sleep. My mind was filled with many memories of conversations we had spoken about college, business and life in general. I remembered I asked her why she never opened a bakery and she said she wasn’t baking for herself. I never understood what that meant and I was never interested in doing what she did. I was too busy being a kid or playing ball, or doing something other than be a domestic homemaker. I wanted to conquer the world, travel and meet people from vast continents. All the while, she was thinking of me. She suffered in silence many years when she could have had better care and medicine to prolong her life with that money. She didn’t want that. She was quite stubborn. She wanted to still take care of me, even after she knew she would be gone. I don’t know how to explain it or her. That day in the hospital, I knew she wanted to tell me, but she knew I would have demanded she keep it for herself. The grasp was my hint, her way of letting me know she had prepared to help me even though she would be gone. I can never repay the life she gave me, although she didn’t know I was just happy with her. So, just as in the church the day of the funeral, all I could do was sit there and think of the last words she’d whispered to me in my ear at the hospital. I reached down, picked up the little black notebook and added these words to the pages, “I love you and will add to this for the next generation.” I then proceeded to put the money back in the bible to continue this family tradition and added a few dollars more for the next owner of our family legacy.