REMEMBERING GRACE HELENA WRIGHT, 1903-1994

Me and my mother Grace, winter of 1938.

I've always been conscious of wet feet...Can't understand why, unless...

When I was a boy, and it chanced to rain,

Mother would always watch for me;

She used to stand by the window pane,
Worried and troubled as she could be.

And this was the question I used to hear, 

The very minute that I drew near;

The words she used, I can't forget,

"Tell me, my boy, if your feet are wet."

Worried about me was mother dear.
As healthy a lad as ever strolled
Over a turnpike, far and near,

'Fraid to death that I'd catch a cold.

Always stood by the window pane, 

Watching for me in the pouring rain;
And her words in my ears are ringing yet:
"Tell me, my boy, if your feet are wet."

Stockings warmed by the kitchen stove,
And slippers ready for me to wear;

Seemed that mother would never tire,

Giving her boy the best of care,

Thinking of him the long day through,

In the worried way that all mothers do;

Whenever it rained she'd start to fret, 

Always fearing my feet were wet.

And now, whenever it rains, I see
A vision of mother in the days of yore,

Still waiting there to welcome me,

As she used to do by the open door.

And always I think as I enter there

Of a mother's love and a mothers care;

Her words in my ears are ringing yet;

"Tell me, my boy, if your feet are wet."