Pimento Cheese Memories

By Hally Franz –

My 92-year-old grandmother went on to her eternal home two days ago. Grandma had been healthy and active most of her life, enduring only a couple years of declining energy and mobility. She was blessed. I, along with all of her family and friends, have a ton of wonderful memories. We were also blessed.

In preparation for the funeral services of Erma Rhea Tucker, we family members have gathered together to recall and document some of our most notable memories of my grandmother. Some are heart-warming, others not necessarily family-friendly, most funny.

My earthly father, who greeted Grandma sometime during the early morning hours on September 5, told me a story about pimento cheese, and the tough, enduring character of his mother. Dad told me about a time when he was a child of perhaps 8 or 10. He, along with his younger brother, rode alongside my grandmother in an old truck as they drove home from the dentist in Louisiana, MO. Grandma drove with one hand while she used her other to roll toilet paper in wads that she shoved into her bleeding mouth. She’d been to the dentist and gotten sixteen teeth pulled. I only recently learned the exact number, because when dad told the story he simply said “every tooth in her head.”

When Grandma and her young sons arrived home, she immediately went to the kitchen and began grinding pounds of pimento cheese for dinner or perhaps some upcoming event. This was how my dad viewed his mother, a resilient and gritty woman. The story has always been a favorite of mine.

Cinnamon rolls, college sports, needlework, old hymns, little league ball, a school cafeteria, Frank Sinatra – those images congregate in my mind when I think of Grandma Tucker. Pimento cheese lingers the longest.

One of the greatest gifts Heavenly Father gives us is the people in our lives. Their influence and inspiration, their love and legacy are among the greatest things about life here on earth, and among the many things to look forward to in Heaven.

PRAYER: Merciful Father, thank You for the loved ones in our lives. What a gift they are to us. Help us to appreciate and remember good times spent with them, and give us the strength to smile when they begin their eternal lives with You.

“Then young women will dance and be glad, young men and old as well. I will turn their mourning into gladness; I will give them comfort and joy instead of sorrow.” (Jeremiah 31:13).