Her father named her Ila. She was my favorite person. I still talk to her, so many years after her death. She is my guardian angel, if I believed in such a thing. And my daughter is her namesake.
It was the little things that I remember about her. Her chocolate chip cookies. Since The Depression she made them with rationed chocolate chips. Five little brown nuggets atop each cookie. The smell of her bathroom. Lilacs and roses. Her soft smile, always there. The sound of her voice, reading Bible verses aloud. The cards she sent to me, with a $1 or $5 tucked in the envelope. The way she took her hair down from her braid-bun each night, brushing it over and over. She was pure kindness and love to me, and to many others.
I have been in a writing slump for nearly 7 years. There are things I'd like to write, thoughts I'd like to put into words, things I've whispered to Ila over the past several years. I suppose I'll write them here. To her.
