Today, my Nanny Opal Gressett Terrell would have been 104. It’s been about 10 years since she’s been gone, and I miss her. When I was growing up, one of the things I remember (besides her great cooking) is listening to Jerry Clower on her big console stereo or any of the many country and western albums she had. She loved cowboy music and cowboy movies, and any time I hear those fiddles play, I think of her.

But I don’t just think about cowboy songs or her cooking when I think of her. She was funny and sweet, and always willing to listen to the weird stories her grandkids told. She was annoyed that her hair stayed pretty much salt-and-pepper her entire later life (she wished it was just all white). She loved telling the story about the drunk hogs in the yard her daddy happened upon when visiting her and Grandpa. (Grandpa was fermenting muscadines in a bucket for homemade wine, but she didn’t know that, and put it in the trough for the hogs. Hilarity ensued.)

She loved to sew and crochet, and pretty much everyone in Dayton had been the recipient at one time or another of some of her potholders, pincushions, quilts or other projects. She pieced together many a quilt, and most members of the family still have at least one of them on a bed or in a linen closet. And, boy, could she bake, and this time of year we’d really luck out because her birthday and Mama’s were just two days apart (Mama’s is Tuesday).

I was lucky to have her in my life for so long and to grow up with her within a mile or two of us. With her and Grandpa around, I got to see every day what love truly is, even when they argued (which was nearly always funny to us kids). They are both missed.