Prim and proper, not considered a beauty with her thin brown hair, smallish eyes a little too close together- a nondescript hazel, She was sturdy in frame – just ripened into womanhood when she made the journey across country in a covered wagon from Iowa to Oregon. There must have been a flood that year that destroyed the lives of many, who with no insurance or social safety net, picked up stakes and moved out West for better opportunities and “higher ground.”
“Higher ground,” she always insisted in her later years. “It’s always important to seek higher ground.” Whenever any member of her family in future generations bought a house or moved, she would ask, “Is it on high ground? It’s very important to be on higher ground.” I always liked to think that she meant much more than the physical higher ground… I think she was also urging us to go for the metaphysical “higher ground.”
“If they knew better, they’d do better.”
(First published 6/19/11)
