It’s always enjoyable to come back from time traveling. If we use our imagination to give life to the memories of our ancestors, we can go back and experience events that they lived, even if we can only experience them to a small degree. The power and abilities of the imagination is just one of the things I learned from my grandmother. Through her stories I also learned just how resourceful and interesting her family was and how it has influenced my family.
My grandmother, pictured right, had family in Jay, Florida; her grandparents owned large sugar cane fields, and also owned and operated a grist mill. She told me stories of howshe and her siblings, 9 in all, would run through the fields and play in the open expanses, and how she would watch her grandfather use his donkey to operate the sugar cane press to make cane sugar. She told me how sweet and natural the cane sugar tasted right off of the press, and how different and interesting it was to watch sugar and grits and cornmeal be made in such an old fashioned way.
My great-great-grandparents were very resourceful outside of the family business also. She told me a story how one day while she and her siblings were running through the fields, an example pictured to the left, she stepped on an old rusty nail 
while jumping down from a fence. Her family was very hardy and self-supporting, and hardly ever went to the doctor. This time was no exception. My grandmother, Helen, said that her grandmother healed her foot completely, just by using her own knowledge, home remedies, and resourcefulness. Her mother, who is pictured below in the back row second from the left along wither her parents and sisters, made a fire, soaked some rags in oil and then let the rags burn under my grandmother’s foot to open the wound. 
Thelma knew that the oil wouldn’t burn up, but that it would just smoke some, flame a little but stay hot enough to open up the wound on my grandmother’s foot. Once the wound was opened and had been cleaned, Thelma used some type of special home remedy to make sure that my grandmother’s foot never got infected or hurt anymore.
Today, we would usually rush to the hospital for antibiotics, a checkup, maybe even a tetanus shot. It’s interesting to hear stories from someone who remembers those 
early times and can recount experiences that we will probably never have on our own. It’s also very interesting to hear about people in your own family from the recent past who were smart and resourceful enough to take care of themselves using just their own knowledge and ingenuity. Pictured to the left is an example of the kind of journals my great-grandmother might have kept her knowledge in.
My mother also inherited this resourceful, independent and self-sufficient nature. She’s always had an entrepreneurial spirit, being involved in everything from single handedly directing my mega-church’s kids ministry, to homeschooling me and my younger brothers, ages 13, 8, and 5 at the times. Most notably, she received her certification as a colon hydro-therapist and owned and operated a very successful health and wellness center for 7 years until home duties called her back home full time. Independence seems to run in my family, as my dad is a successful entrepreneur working in the financial aid and college planning business, and I have deviated from the traditional jobs teenagers hold by focusing on my studies and building myself as a brand that I can “sell” in my career as an actor and model.
Resourcefulness can take many shapes, as indicated by the evolution it has taken in my family over the years. The memories and stories of my ancestors never let us forget where we started, taking me personally back in time to places and events far out of my own ability to fully imagine. If you looked around and searched, I’m sure you could do some time traveling of your own.
Works Consulted
Roland Harper Photo Collection, Hoole Special Collections Library
Relatives