Grandmother's Purse

My purse.

I carry it where ever I go.

It is bright red with white polka dots the size of silver dollars. The clasp is gold, peeling and rusting with age.
The fabric is patent leather, so it sticks to the skin of my thigh if I leave it resting there for too long.

It doesn't match my clothes and shoes. Come to think about it, it doesn't match anything I own. For I don't own any red clothing. And white is not my style.

But that's all well and fine. It doesn't have to match. It was my grandmother's purse, the one she gave to me as a child. I will always remember how she pointed to it with shaky hands as she whispered in an equally shaky voice, "I told them to pull that pocketbook out just for you, little girl."

They were the last words she'd spoken exactly an hour before she died.

The purse itself is important, but what it contains is just as important, if not more: a bible, heavily marked and tattered, the gold leaf pages now a dull yellow; a small black journal, stuffed and overflowing with my grandmother's joys and pains.

And there is a black and white photo of she and I as we sat on a bench in the pouring rain patiently waiting for a bus that must've lost its way.

I was cuddled up next to my grandmother that day. She'd pulled me close, her arm wrapped tightly around my shoulder as she held a tiny black umbrella with broken spines over our heads. That day, she asked someone passing by to take a picture of the two of us.

Later while sitting in the warmth of the bus, I asked her why we took a picture while it was raining.

She said it was because even in a storm, we could still smile.

It was simple enough, but too simple for my little mind to capture a hold of at the time.

But I understood after her death, the photo and what it meant, and how it went hand-in-hand with that bible and journal.

My grandmother left me a piece of herself, a piece of her very heart. And I leaned and understood that if I didn't have anything else in life, I was richly prepared.

For she had left me all that I would ever need to make it through every storm of life.

From Women of Color Writing Workshop, January 2014. 
7 minute writing workshop. We were given a sheet of paper containing some 25 items that could be found in a purse. We were told to pick 3 of these items and write a story about the purse and these three items. 

It should be obvious what I chose:  a spiritual book, a photo, and a journal.

My grandmother is still alive, but I remember back in the 70s, she was always taking pictures. She had a Kodak camera that took black and white pictures. There was a flash cube that she would have to place on top of the camera.  And even back then she had a big blocky camcorder, and so there is film of me as a little girl, running around. (It was awful whenever I brought boyfriends over, and she would pull out this projector screen and run these films. Ugh).

She is, at the age of 84, so amazed by the technology of this day. She doesn't understand it all. She was ahead her time some 40 years ago.

So I thought of her as I wrote this piece. She and I are so much alot. I love pictures and photos. I love my bible. And you know I love writing and journalling.

I think I will call her.

And the next time I see her, I will read it to her.