“Have you ever been nightcrawler hunting, Henry?” I texted my 11-year-old grandson, who loves to fish.

He replied he hadn’t. So, I told him how to do it, especially since the rain where he lived was expected to stop before nightfall.

Looking down from above, I’m sure my late-dad, was delighted. After all, how would his great-grandson know about catching these delicious worms for fish if I hadn’t told the boy? Also, because I did, Henry knows a little bit more about his great-grandfather, Bob Wheeler, who loved to fish and who would have been 102-years-old

That’s just it, Ladies. Our culture is not known for valuing the wisdom of Older Women; but, we have so much to pass on. If we don’t speak up, how will those younger than us know important information, history, recipes, or –God forbid – family secrets?

(In case you are wondering, to hunt for nightcrawlers, you need a wet lawn, a dark night, a can with some dirt in it and a flashlight. You get on your knees and shine the light on the lawn. A worm will come up out of the grass. You pick it up and throw it in the can. Put the can in the refrigerator until you are ready to go fishing the next day.)

When I was 9-years-old, my paternal grandmother, Georgia Rose Wheeler, gave me a photo of my paternal great-great grandparents. I wrote their last name on the back of it. Some 30 years later, I dug out that photo, delved into their genealogy, and learned the family secrets, which had been buried for generations since my grandmother’s marriage did not last.  As my father lay dying, he asked questions about his father, who left the family when dad was seven. I was so happy I was able to give him the information.

As I write this, I find it interesting my grandmother gave me the photo and not one of her other three grandchildren. They became a science teacher, a real estate agent, and a utilities company manager. Did Grandma know then I would go into public relations and become a writer and an historian? I can’t imagine my sister or cousins doing the research nor writing the subsequent book about our family. I think this is an example of how older women often have intuitive insight.

Older women can give valuable history lessons, too. For example, last November, I drove behind my age 40-something-year-old son in-law to Breckenridge, Colorado on I70 West. When we got there, he mentioned to his brother, “Yeah, my mother-in-law was on my tail all the way here.”

I chuckled and explained to him, a California transplant, that until the late 1970s the Colorado speed limit was 80 miles per hour, and sometimes I forget it was lowered because of the Oil Embargo. He didn’t know either of these facts. Across the nation, and certainly in Colorado, the oil embargo had major business, environmental and life-style implications.

Here is another example of a history lesson I gave a couple of years ago when I was addressing an audience for an “International Women’s Day” conference in my town. I could not believe a majority of people did not know about looking for a job in the classified section of the Sunday newspaper 30 years or so ago. They were astounded when I explained there used to be two columns in the “Help Wanted” section: one for men and one for women.

Recently, I watched Henry’s twin sister, Lucy, make a great green salad. I realized that somehow she knew the many-generation-family secret when she added a little pinch of herbs before she tossed the ingredients. I know my maternal great-great-grandmother, Consolata Giordano, was looking down from above with a smile on her face. Obviously, her secret had been given to her great-great-great-great-granddaughter!

Copyright – Elizabeth J. Wheeler, June 9, 2019