Dear Maya Angelou

Dear Maya,

Nooooooooooooooo! I cried. 

And I haven’t been able to see straight all day

Thought it was an eyelash in my eye. It was.

And then the tears kept coming. 

Not crying for you. I’m happy for you.

Crying for me. Crying for all of us left behind

Always wondering how we will get by

without people like you.

Last time I heard your voice in an interview

I said to myself

I said

Joni! 

Listen well! 

Hear this voice! 

It won’t be long now til it is silent.

Again.

Good thing we live in a world and time

when we can still hear your recorded voice.

Now, I just wanted to let you know how much

we need your words and your voice. 

Maybe more now than ever before.

I know that as a writer, you couldn’t help but write.

I know you couldn’t help but sing, dance, learn, teach, praise, give voice.

But I still want to thank you for all of it.

Thank you for sharing yourself with us.

Love, Joni

A whole lot of education.

2009

My mother died on May 17th, 2009 and so, of course I always think about her on that date. It also happened to be her grandchild’s birthday/graduation from college weekend. And this year it happened to be the youngest grandchild’s graduation from high school weekend. This is also a year that two more grandchildren graduate from college.

It feels like an important milestone to mark and so I wanted to send congratulations to my parents. Dad died in 1998 and I hope they are resting in peace. They raised and educated five of us — and helped educate a few others here and there. Now that the youngest grandchild graduated from high school, we can say we raised and educated their 12 grandchildren. 

My mother went back to school for her A.A. degree -- 30+ years after she graduated from high school. My father scared me straight when I was trying to flunk out of college. I'm sure we are all grateful to them for their inspiration and example. Perhaps the 12 educated grandchildren is enough thanks?

It’s nearly impossible to get all 12 of them together, but it’s happened a few times. I wanted to celebrate this occasion by documenting a few of those times, especially because I know we all would have liked to get together to celebrate the three graduations this year. This is not an exhaustive collection of photos, but it's the ones I have. Or at least it's the ones that aren't too embarrassing to anyone.

Well done, Mom and Dad! Well done to all of us!

1987

1992

1995

2001

2009

2013

2013