I just can’t let it go


My grandfather on my daddy’s side was born on July 29, 1898. His name was George Patton Morris. One week from today he would be  120 years old.

This is my grandfather with his mother, Margaret Antonio Moore Morris, in front of what I assume was their home in Walker County, Texas. My grandfather looks to be about 2 years old.

He was safe, had food to eat, a place to sleep…grew up working hard on a farm with his four sisters and five brothers in east Texas…

… his family farm was about 420 miles north of Brownsville, Texas where today, this moment,  more than 1,400 migrant children remain in a Wal Mart converted to a prison facility for them.

I’m trying to imagine what their pictures will look like when they look back, if they have the chance to look back, on their childhood experiences in a department store detention facility.

The roulette wheel of life spins out of control. I hit a lucky number.

Stay tuned.

 

 

About Sheila Morris

Sheila Morris is a personal historian, essayist with humorist tendencies, lesbian activist, truth seeker and speaker in the tradition of other female Texas storytellers including her paternal grandmother. In December, 2017, the University of South Carolina Press published her collection of first-person accounts of a few of the people primarily responsible for the development of LGBTQ organizations in South Carolina. Southern Perspectives on the Queer Movement: Committed to Home will resonate with everyone interested in LGBTQ history in the South during the tumultuous times from the AIDS pandemic to marriage equality. She has published five nonfiction books including two memoirs, an essay compilation and two collections of her favorite blogs from I'll Call It Like I See It. Her first book, Deep in the Heart: A Memoir of Love and Longing received a Golden Crown Literary Society Award in 2008. Her writings have been included in various anthologies - most recently the 2017 Saints and Sinners Literary Magazine. Her latest book, Four Ticket Ride, was released in January, 2019. She is a displaced Texan living in South Carolina with her wife Teresa Williams and their dogs Spike, Charly and Carl. She is also Naynay to her two granddaughters Ella and Molly James who light up her life for real. Born in rural Grimes County, Texas in 1946 her Texas roots still run wide and deep.
This entry was posted in Humor, Lesbian Literary, Life, Personal, photography, politics, racism, Reflections, Slice of Life, The Way Life Is and tagged . Bookmark the permalink.

6 Responses to I just can’t let it go

  1. Wayside Artist says:

    I’m learning a lot these past few years about just how privledged I am. I hit a lucky number too.

    Liked by 1 person

  2. Luanne says:

    I feel blessed, too. Or just lucky.

    Liked by 1 person

  3. We love the old pictures of the old generation, Sheila, there’s so much nostalgia in it 🙂 Granny’s birthday is on a 13th, that’s Grandpaw’s Lucky number 😀 Pawkisses for a wonderful week ahead 🙂 💗

    Liked by 1 person

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