My mother's mother, my Grandmother Ella, was deeply involved in my life from the moment I was born in 1944, in a small, one-bedroom apartment on the campus of the Haskell Indian Institute, a national U.S. Indian Boarding School in Lawrence, Kansas.
She was an inspiration and stayed in my corner until she passed to the Other Side Camp. When needed, I can feel her presence spiritually. Her father was John Wesley Parker, an esteemed leader within the Chickasaw Nation during a time of great challenges.
She was widowed with seven children and spent the rest of her life caring for girls in Indian Boarding Schools. After she retired, she spent most of her time living with us on Mill Creek, where my father raised cutting horses after he retired, with trips to my mothers, sisters and brothers, and where my father raised cutting horses after he retired,
I always knew when my grandmother was coming. All her worldly possessions were in six big cardboard boxes delivered in a big mail truck. She would only use the contents of one or two boxes, but she always traveled with six.
My grandmother was an inventor, poet, and visionary. When I was 12 she had me planting ginseng along Mill Creek. She envisioned a walk-in bathtub for elders, long before they appeared in the marketplace. She helped me set up a Christmas card business when I was 7 or 8.
She was also very well-versed in Chickasaw history, including the twin brothers, Chick and Chock, who founded the Chickasaw and Choctaw Nations.
This is a song she wrote in honor of my parents' marriage in 1943. She wrote other songs, as well. I always told her, " Grandma, we need to have your songs put to music."
It has been done, with only the word redskin changed. She wrote another called Music from Heaven, which I will share in time.
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