The Piano Lesson

Family Origins

May,31,2015

For always and forever

Like the ever changing stream family is a constant current of blood moving and evolving with time. The water moves along true to the heart, with an undercurrent strong enough to hold you under, and with hidden depths around every bend. However family changes the struggles that we experienced make us stronger and unite the streams into a raging river. With every era in time we experience new struggles, accomplishments, heartache, and suffering. But a few memories have keep my family alive, and have reminded us that no matter how hard things get we can prevail. Life may not be perfect, but with faith, trust, and family anything is possible. During the the 1920’s my great grandmother being only a young girl of about 6 survived the Great depression with her 5 brothers and sister. She came to America from Poland when she was only an infant and her father settled then in Detroit Michigan. He worked in a factory and she tells me how they barely had food to eat. She once told me that she got her first christmas present at the age of 13 it was a little baby doll with a purple dress black curls and sky blue eyes. She loved that baby she once told me. My great grandma never had a christmas tree until she was 12 because it was too much money. She always told me that she survived because of the church. Our family comes from a devoted line of Catholics and she has been going to the same church all her life, the church that her parents first went to when they came from Poland a poor family hoping to give their children a chance to prosper. My Great Grandmother is proud to say that she survived the great Depression, and from that point in her life she knew that with hope, and prayer any problem can be fixed. The second thing i would remember in my family is WWII. On my father's side of the family my grandmother had 4 brothers drafted into the war. Only 3 came back from fighting. They were strapping farm boys from small town Missouri they all had hopes and dreams but the war changed them. they were flying fighter jets when one was hit and Dick was killed. I remember the day she told me this she had her head held high and a tear in her high when she said “I miss my brother everyday. He was only a baby of 20 and had a girl waiting for him and a good head on his shoulders, but I couldn't be more proud of him. I know that he is with god and one day he will take me to get that ice cream like he promised. But for right now I am going to live if not for myself than for all the young men and women who never got the chance.” My grandma was very close to her brother and the loss affected the whole family but it brought the kids a;ll closer together for Dick lived on through them. Our patriotic spirit has also reflected with the SS-Pruitt a military submarine used in the navy for 15 years. It was a way to be apart of the wart i suppose it was our family's moment in history. In the 1960’s my great grandma Coker was cheated on by her husband, so she created the divorce doll. It was a doll made to the exact dimensions of your former husband that woman could beat up and dress in their old husbands clothes. This creation let her business of doll making and collecting a notional business. She got to have many tv interviews and had books published about her live she also adopted a total of 15 children and was a single mother to all of them. She proved that a woman didn't need a man, that in a time when women were still lesser than men that she was just as important as the next person. this took so much courage and strength. My family has always fished, it is apart of us. Fishing to my family is like breathing as soon as you can walk we stick a poll in your hand. So i would add my family's love for the livelihood too because to me it's apart of everyday life. For my last family value or memory i would have the church. If it was not for the church my family would be so different. Every child was raised in the church. It didn't matter how poor we were when we didn't have gas money to get to church we walked. When we were richer than dogs we funded mission trips. We have been chiseled so much that it would not be justified to keep God out of my family. It was always a place that we could go and I pray always will.

Author's Note

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