My Inheritance

My mom called me last week and told me a box was on the way. She called it my Inheritance. lol She goes thru phases of cleaning things out and getting rid of them. Sometimes asks me if I want something.

Over the yrs there were only 3 things I wanted that would have disappointed me a lot if I didn't get them. Two Ive gotten already and the third came yesterday. The first was my grammas very fragile hand blown Christmas ornaments.  I remember these on a silly plastic tree that stood on top of grampas big floor radio. It had bubble lights (I have some of those too) and these ornaments. Grampa would put a night light on in that room so he could come and go and not be in total darkness. (I have that too!) But come Christmas time it was magical in there. The tree was lit instead. I fell madly in love with that little plastic tree with the bubble lights and delicate glass ornaments.

One day when I was home for a visit, mom packaged them up for me to hand carry home on the airplane. Every yr. now they are the first ornaments put on my trees. My kids and grandkids have all had the honor of doing that and hearing the story.

The other thing I wanted was my Dad's. He was in the Navy many yrs ago. He had a pea coat he kept from that time. And in that pea coat were dragons! You see back in 1945 he was in China. And he had a Chinese tailor put beautiful embroidered dragon panels on the inside of his coat. It even has his name and the yr. When I was a teen, pea coats were all the rage and I wanted to wear my dads. But he wouldn't let me. Yrs later he let my brother tho and I was heartbroken. I told him how much that coat mean to me and how I loved the dragons.

A few yrs. ago a pkg. came in the mail for my birthday. I opened it up and inside were the dragon panels. I burst into tears. I called dad up to thank him and he said why are you crying? You see I grew up hearing about his stories of being in China during the war and seeing those panels. They will always remind me of my dad. And when I couldn't have the coat I was sad. Dad told me tho the coat fell apart after all these yrs. He saved the buttons and these panels. He knew I wanted them. They were the best birthday present.

 And so there was one more thing left and it came this week. Makes me kind of sad too knowing time is passing so much that now I'm getting these things. Long ago when my mom was little she drank from a Shirley Temple mug. It has Shirley's face painted on there and its cobalt blue glass. When I was a little girl I would spend summers at grammas and gramma would pull out the mug for me. Now I loved Shirley and I love blue glass so that was the perfect cup for me.

And so I grew up using it. Gramma passed away and mom got it back. But I always wanted it. Over time my moms birthdays came and I found out there were more pieces. They were actually a set. So I bought mom one yr. the bowl to match it. Another yr. the creamer. And they sat on her shelves for many yrs. She knew I always wanted them. She said maybe this trip home she would give them to me. I just knew I wanted to get them before mom died. My brother will be handling her affairs and I was afraid he would just get rid of them before I could get them. 

 And so this week, mom sent my inheritance. I love them! And now maybe one day Ill pass them on to my family. Sadly by the time I got this, my own grandkids were grown. But maybe my daughter can save it for hers and gramma would be smiling knowing its getting passed on still.