I didn’t get to spend a
lot of time with my grandparents when I was small. The one year we spent Christmas
with my family in Kentucky, my grandma gave me a pain-by-number set. I was nine, and really wanted to be an
artist, so when I saw the paint set, I wanted to rip it open and start in on
it. It was a busy Christmas, and there
were a lot of people in the house. I’m
sure my grandma had a hundred other things to do that day, but she didn’t do
them. She cleared a space and helped me
set the paint pots out in order. We each
painted a picture, mine a little squiggly around the edges, hers a masterpiece
in my nine-year-old eyes. She helped me
with the difficult parts, like the eyes. Then she had the pictures framed and mailed
them to me after I went home. I still
have them. I hung them over my daughter’s
crib when she was born.
That was the only real
memory I had of my grandma Austin, until I turned thirteen and my parents
started sending me to stay with family during our summer break. I had just moved back to the U.S. from Italy
and I didn’t really like the idea of melting in the Kentucky heat, but I was
excited to see the grandma and grandpa I barely knew. So I went, not really sure what to expect.
My grandma and grandpa
Austin’s house was set back on a hill, surrounded by trees. We had to cross over a bridge, and drive
around a pond. In the evenings, my
sister and I chased fireflies, something I had never even seen before. Sometimes we’d sit out on the deck and see
who could eat a slice of watermelon fastest.
We fell asleep listening to bullfrogs sing. We woke to the keening of cicadas. We swam, we fished, we gave apples to the
horses. We burned to a crisp in the hot
summer sun. It was magical.
It was here that I first
started writing. My stories were usually
about dragons and run-away princesses, set deep in forests that bore a striking
similarity to the wooded areas around my grandma’s pond. Most of the characters shared names with my aunts,
uncles, and cousins. The plot was a mess
and the sentences were sloppy, but hey, I was thirteen. It was my first serious attempt at
writing. It was also the first time my
audience wasn’t a teacher.
My grandma, who worked a
full-time job, cooked, cleaned and watched over us kids, still found time to
read my stories. She encouraged me. She wasn’t the first person to say, “You can
do anything you put your mind to,” but she was the first one I believed. When I wanted to paint, she’d given me a
canvas. Now that I wanted to write, she
became my audience. She always made time for me, and I never felt like a bother to her. I came back from
those trips with a sense of pride in myself.
I came back each summer knowing, more than ever, that I was a writer.
I won’t lie, I was pretty
lucky to grow up in Europe. I saw things
most kids that age haven’t even heard about, and those experiences have probably
influenced my writing more than I realize.
But it’s the time I spent with my family that taught me the most
important lessons. It was under my
grandma’s guidance and encouragement that I became a writer, and for that, I
will always be thankful.
Motherhood is a difficult
job, and I can’t end this post without thanking not only my grandma, but also
my mom, who taught me how to read and then showed me how to love it. I don’t know how she raised us kids without
our grandparents around to help—I know I can’t even manage a weekend. When I write super women, these are the
examples I draw from, and I’m lucky to have them in my life.
