Dear Reader

A Reader’s Story

I love to hear your stories! And I was thrilled to be given permission to share this grandmother’s story shared by a fellow creative at our Book Club last Thursday. Below is a photo of her grandmother.

Grandma Gillin was a pioneer of the Women’s Institute in Bruntwood, Ontario, Canada. In November 1964, she was due to give her ‘motto’ for a long life. Unfortunately she was taken ill and was in hospital where she wrote her thoughts which became a treasured legacy of the Institute.

In hearing her words, I couldn’t help wondering what it would have been like for me to hear my grandmother’s advice for a well lived life.

I’m sure my friend won’t mind if I claim her grandmother’s words for my motto for a good life. Certainly there’s a lot in here that I’d like my grandchildren to think on. For instance:

“Nobody grows old by merely living a number of years. People grow old only by deserting their ideals. Years wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm is to wrinkle the soul. Worry, doubt, self-distrust, fear and despair, these are the long years that bow the head and turn the growing spirit back to dust.

Whether 70 or 16, there is in everybody’s being’s heart, the love of wonder; the sweet amazement at the stars and the star-like things and thoughts; the undaunted challenge of events; and the joy at the game of life.

You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt, as young as your self-confidence, as old as your fear, as young as your hope, as old as your despair!

Grandma Gillen lived her faith. This is obvious in her final advice, knowing surely that her time was ending. I would love to have known her. Her sense of humour and her love for people is still an inspiration 60 years later:

Lord, thou knowest better than I know myself that I am growing older. Keep me from getting talkative, and particularly from the fatal habit of thinking I must say something on every subject and on every occasion.

Release me from the craving to try to straigthen out everybody’s affairs. I ask for grace enough to listen to the tales of others’ pains. Help me to endure them with patience, but seal my lips on my own aches – they are increasing and my love of rehearsing them is becoming sweeter as the years go by. Teach me the glorious lesson that occasionally it is possible for me to be wrong.

Keep me reasonably sweet. I do not want to be a saint – some of them are so hard to live with! But a sour old woman is one of the crowning works of the devil.

Make me thoughtful, but not bossy. With my vast store of wisdom, it seems a pity not to use it all. But thou knowest, Lord, that I want a few friends at the end.

I do hope you enjoy Grandma Gillen’s words, too. She’s certainly given me food for thought.

Comment on Last Week’s Conversation

Another friend enjoyed the snippets from Emily Perkins and shared that she went to school with Emily. It’s wonderful to know that author’s we love and respect are human too! It was obvious to Emily’s classmate that she spoke the truth about herself in the article quoted from last week.

Works in Progress

I’m enjoying simultaneously writing those two pieces I mentioned last newsletter. The process seems slow – and a lot of it happens when I’m walking or doing chores, and when I’m sleeping – and when I’m at the gym, and later at the cafe.

Memoir update

I thought I would be drawing on my own life experiences to illustrate the similarities in my family generations. But it seems I’m starting with a fictionalised story of my 3rd great grandmother’s life. Fictionalised because I don’t even know her name. And I’m having fun researching the place and times she must have lived. It’ll be a challenge, and fun, to then move to illustrating the early life of her daughter, my 2nd great grandmother. I’m excited about this project and hope those who have gone before me have left enough of their imprint on my mind and in my veins so that I can do their stories justice.

Book Review

Dear Psychosis – A story of hope and love through a family’s journey of mental health by Sarah Martin

I also loved this book and gave it 5 stars on Amazon. Addiction is a symptom of mental ill health and although Sarah’s book focuses on the expression of drug induced psychosis, her journey to Turkey to rescue her daughter has many parallels with my own journey with the consequences of my son’s addiction to methamphetamine.

Amazon includes this in the description of Sarah’s book: To some, it may be a warning, to others a story of hope. Most of all, it shows how the love and care given by strangers and family alike paved the way for their daughter’s recovery and inspired the family to break the silence around mental illness.

Click here to read my review of Dear Psychosis. Enjoy!

Till next time,
Love
Stephanie

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My thoughts for Living Life in 2024 and beyond:

“Write it on my heart that every day is
the best day of the year”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Remember that sometimes not getting
what you want is a wonderful stroke of luck”
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Dalai Lama

“I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave [person] is not [the one] who does not feel afraid, but [the one] who conquers that fear.”

Nelson Mandela

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