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Hullo! How are you? I am covered in a sunburn. It is pretty painful. I am vacationing in an exclusive gated community called Jasper Highlands and they have a gorgeous pool perched on a cliff. It is so pretty that I didn’t want to leave. I am about the color of a lobster, but that’s ok, I had a good time.

It reminds me of when I was 15 and my Connecticut grandmother flew down to Tennessee, I was at my cousin Buck’s pool all day and got a brutal sunburn, then flew to Connecticut the very next day in severe pain. I reckon I haven’t learned a thing.

Just to get any chance that I could to be with my Grammy, as we called her, I would have flown outside of the plane on a wing. We just always connected. She used to tell me that I was her favorite grandchild. She had such a total impact on my life; career choices, cooking, sense of humor, style, and moxy, which means nerve. We always had the nerve for sure. My Grammy was always independent and had no use for male entitlement. She liked and respected men, but she wasn’t going to frame her life around one. Someone might as well have tried to harness the wind.

While at a doctor’s appointment a few months ago I struck up a conversation with a couple. Somehow, we got on the subject of grandmothers. I told her, “My grandmother always drove a sports car like a speed demon, practically running everybody over.” I’ll never forget it, the lady looked at me and said, “and you’re just like her aren’t you.” Ha. A truer statement was never said. If it’s the truth you better own it.

Grammy was one of the original career women, a chief administrator for a renowned surgeons medical arts building. She also managed his gray rock mansion which was across the road from William F. Buckley’s estate in Sharon Connecticut. She did it all with aplomb and finesse, wearing silk blouses with matching suede skirts. She designed and had built her octagon, wood home, which was on a bank above the Hollenbeck River in an evergreen forest. I cannot even begin to describe to wonderful times that I had there.

I try to pass on my grandmother’s legacy that she taught me of a woman’s strength and value to my daughters and granddaughters. My daughters are all beautiful, motivated, career oriented, fun and great personalities, enjoying life, but taking no disrespect, especially from patriarchal men. My grandmother took delight in verbally and with great dignity and class born of her prep school background of taking down a dominant, disrespectful man a peg or two. A proud legacy, and a necessary one in this patriarchal society.

Now, I really must go-I’m taking my 6-speed mini cooper for a run and thinking of Grammy. Thank-You for the legacy Grammy!