I have many incredible stories about my grandmother, Grace Lipscomb.  Most of the stories are predicated upon the fact that she was an unassuming authority on just about everything related to navigating family life.  If it had to do with raising kids, meting discipline, living within a budget, or coexisting with (ahem) challenging personalities, she knew the answer.   This answer often came in a set format:  there was the intent look as she listened, absorbing your problem.  Then the grain of wisdom she would gift you, followed by a story from her life that reminded you that she had not only seen your challenge before, but had likely overcome it amid far more adverse circumstances. 

It was with great excitement that we were expecting her visit to Oregon in the winter of 2002 after the birth of our daughter Journey.  Grace’s first great-grandchild!  This would be her biggest trip in a while, flying multiple flights cross-country accompanying my dad and brother Andy.  

We were excited to honor all of our visitors, but the familiar lurking fear that all first-time parents experience when exposing their parenting style to grandparents and great-grandparents was starting to crowd the room.  After all, we were playing host to parenting royalty!  

Fortunately, our guests were very gentle with us, giving us space to do things our way and giving us the help and advice that we so desperately needed in that early stage of parenthood.  Seeing my father and brother hold Journey for the first time was as special as I’d imagined it would be, but seeing my grandmother’s reaction to holding her first great-grandchild was something exceptionally powerful.  Watching that first touch was like seeing a literal bridge built between generations of our family.  They connected instantly, a connection they would always share.  

If you don’t travel much, taking a short trip from the east coast to the west coast can be a difficult on a person’s constitution, particularly sleep patterns.  Although we were sensing a bit of this in all of our visitors, we were touched when grandma offered to watch Journey for the evening so the rest of us could  go out and enjoy a dinner and some much-needed “grown-up” conversation.  We eagerly took her up on this; after all, Journey was a pretty easy baby and we were leaving her with a first-ballot parenting hall-of-famer.  We got them set up, went on our way, and had a delightful evening out.  Upon our return, it became obvious, despite my grandmother’s insistence that “it was not that bad”, that Journey had not made life easy in our absence.  Our wonderful evening out had been paralleled by a trying evening at home, with an unconsolable crying child and a jet lagged (but exceptionally skilled) great-grandparent.  Both Journey and my grandmother looked relieved to see us when we got home, and in that short window of time where custody of our daughter was handed back to us, I realized that I had learned a few fundamental parenting lessons from one of the greats.  First, that it is not easy for anyone to raise a child (some of us just make it look easy). Second, that dogged optimism can keep the ship sailing, even when it seems like it’s sinking.  Lastly, that family is always there for you.  

I talked with my grandmother fairly often in the last 15 years, and not a conversation passed without her asking when we were moving back to Virginia.  For years I thought these requests were a bid to reel me back to a time when I was in a position to be more easily supervised by family, but over time I realized that it came from a deeper place of love, and her want to give to my family gifts of knowledge, experience, and shared time together.  These are gifts that I have received and taken to heart, and although we still live further away from our family than we’d like to be, these goals guide us in our lives and interactions and make us better people.