Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
“So, I love my Jubilee-of-the-mountain-born grandma Gladys, but there's also a problem,” nine-year-old Milton Trent was telling his best friend nine-year-old George Ludlow. “The problem is, Gracie is going to be attached to her hip and re-attached to all their shared Jubileeness and then be running all over everybody more than ever.”
“That's not even what you need to worry about,” George said. “I'm sure your Grandma Gladys doesn't discriminate, so Gracie is going to introduce her two best friends to Grandma Gladys, and although my sister Amanda is going to soak up the Jubilee-of-the-mountain love and remain a sweetheart, my sister Edwina is already deadly and is going to get more run-all-over-everybody Jubileeness by adoption.”
“Naw, look, man, that's not even at the level of a problem. That's at the level of nine and nine is eighteen and so together we're old enough to strike out on our own for our own protection – borrow your big sister Eleanor's phone and I'll get Velma's and we'll meet back here and start looking at rentals in ten minutes.”
“But Milton, how are we going to pay rent?”
“My Grandma Gladys would be the first to tell you: 'be serious about getting free, and the Lord will take care of the rest. The earth is the Lord's, the universe is abundant, and whatever you need, God got it.'”
“Oh, that's so Gladys!” Milton's Stepforth grandma, Mrs. Velma Stepforth, said.
“These children have spent so much time with all y'all … they are just miniatures of y'all and it's adorable,” Mrs. Maggie Lee from next door said. “Henry is a miniature – albeit a very large one in a colonel's uniform – of his grandfather Sgt. Horace Fitzhugh Lee, and I'm very like my grandmother Maria.”
“Grandparent babies are the best,” Mrs. Stepforth said. “If you think about it, Maggie, back in the day in both the African American and Italian American communities, this is how we lived, and maybe the point of the 2020s is to get us back to doing the right thing in our families. We weren't meant to have the generations all over the place, not connected. Children should get to know who they come from, and all the parts of themselves.”
“I agree … Harry and I are much closer to our grandparents and my parents living here than in Big Loft, and since the state conservatorship is taking away his job at the end of October, we'll have much more time to stay connected with our Ludlow cousins and have them meet our children that the Lord gives us and also their Lee-of-the-Mountain relatives and my Milano relatives.”
“Sounds like a great plan to me,” Mrs. Stepforth said, “especially now that nine and nine is eighteen and George and Milton are moving as soon as they find a rental.”
“Or until the next distraction – whichever comes first!” Mrs. Lee said.
“Like Gladys my counterpart says, the earth is the Lord's and the universe is abundant!” Mrs. Stepforth said, and the two women enjoyed a good laugh.