Bayou Kids | Grandparents

Cherishing Time With and As Them
article by Cindy G. Foust

Greetings from the comfy chair on my patio dear BayouLife friends. My hope is that you are enjoying this wonderful heat reprieve in what is the last few days of July. I know I’ve written about this many times, but I’ll say it again, it seems like time is flying by at warp speed. How can it be August already? Many folks, quite possibly, will start pulling out the Christmas trees in the next few weeks. I’m kidding of course, but because many of the retail stores are already “decorating for Christmas,” so we might feel so inclined to as well. Multiple television channels are running Christmas movie marathons for the proverbial “Christmas in July” so hey, maybe we should just jump on the bandwagon and pull out the elves and tinsel. Shoot…maybe we just leave it up all year and not have the pain and worry of dragging it all out again. I say all this in jest of course, because the end of summer also offers us a time to slow down and smell the roses, right? Many of us have been traveling and enjoying the dog days of summer, albeit in the cool temperatures of our homes. 

Speaking of, my family had a wonderful vacation last month, and my little granddaughter made her first trip to the beach. She was delightful, perfect and a true beach baby.  I think last month I intended to roll out my official grandmother moniker, incidentally, one that took me an entire year to decide on. There were several in the running and before you ask, because many people have, this was especially important to me to be called something special in my “grandmother-hood.” I’m not kidding. Oh how the pendulum swung back and forth between many names, to the point that I finally said, “Just let her call me Cindy.” Seriously, that’s my name so there would never be any confusion about who she was addressing, right? Incidentally, my nieces and nephews call me Cha-Cha so there was always that option. Except, what if my granddaughter couldn’t say Cha-Cha and came out with Ca-Ca which is “number 2” in Italian. I couldn’t have that, either. There were many options on the table and I actually tried some of them out on our little baby after she got here. I’m serious, my daughter-in-law’s mother had hers picked out from the get-go, Sweetie, because, she is in fact, one of the sweetest people I know and it fits her like a glove. Then one day, I’m sitting on my patio watching my donkey, rocking baby Britton, and it dawns on me that one of the single most important and influential people in my own life was my grandmother, Bitsy, and she called me “LuLu.” Let me go back to the first of this story where I said I would just be called “Cindy.” My grandmother called me Cindy-Lou for most of my life. In her later years, she dropped Cindy and called me “LuLu.” For years, I would answer the phone and she’d day “LuLu have you seen the weather channel…it’s about to storm!” And then in the last few years of her life, she simply called me “Lu.” So, on a quiet day in the summer of 24, I rocked back and forth, holding this precious baby gift and became “LuLu.” I tear up even as I type it.

If you read my column last month, you know I shared the grief I am feeling after the loss of my daddy. It’s been several years since we lost Bitsy, but she’s still here with me, with us, on a daily basis. How can she not be? Because through her and because of her, I am who I am. Bitsy wasn’t a career woman with a formal education but she was smart, and savvy and quite the comedian. She worked hard and instilled in her children and grandchildren that same work ethic. She saved money like there was no tomorrow and quietly hid it in a Folgers coffee can in her pantry. She was principled and stood on the “good book” for the way she lived her life…unapologetic for her beliefs (even when they differed from ours) and unashamed that her quiet life on the “hill” never resulted in million-dollar homes or an Academy award. She was honest and loyal and the person who you wanted to take shopping, because she’d never let you buy the pants that made you look chubby. In thinking about this month’s column, which I sometimes align with the magazine’s theme, my thoughts were quickly consumed with our “food edition.” This, my BayouLife friends, is my favorite edition because, well, food is my passion. I love shopping for it, I love preparing it, I love serving it and I love eating it. I’m happiest when my family and friends are in my home, around my table, enjoying the food I’ve prepared. That food lineage is directly related to the relationship I had with my grandmother, who was always in her kitchen, or close by, preparing the next meal. I could often be found sitting on her counter watching her fry me homemade French fries or homemade cornbread to go with our milk. Her kitchen was her domain and she loved us being part of that. Her meals weren’t overly sophisticated…she didn’t have the benefit of the internet or Pinterest when she was trying to figure out a new way to use the figs she had grown, but she knew what tasted good and she knew how to get it there with the simplest, freshest ingredients that she oftentimes grew herself. When I think back to the origin of my love affair with all things culinary, it started with Bitsy. Her warm, loving home, the smells, the good food, the “tater salad” that my daddy loved so much, it takes over my senses like it was yesterday. I have several of her serving pieces, her bowls, her cast iron skillets that I have now passed to my son, and each time we use one, she is still here. Standing in my kitchen, bossing me around (wonder where I get that from) as I prepare my next meal. 

So, the end of this column again finds me teary-eyed and nostalgic as I make my way into the grandparent kingdom. I want those same memories for Britton…I want her to have her own apron and her own mixer and her own step stool as she works alongside her LuLu the same way I worked alongside Bitsy. Each time she walks in my home, I want those same smells and sounds to engulf her so that she feels safe, and loved. I miss my grandmother, I do, and what I wouldn’t give to walk in her house and hear “LuLu, are you hungry because I just put a pot of pintos on the stove.” But, her memory is strong, her presence is with me and I am up to the task of spending my days aspiring to be as much like her as I possibly can.

Cindy G. Foust is a wife, mom, author and blogger. You can find her blog at the alphabetmom.com for weekly columns about home life,  parenting, small business stories and insight with a smidgen of literacy. Give her a like or follow on Facebook and Instagram.