{the watch}

Hello all,

I'm back again. I had a nagging to write again today. Since it's St. Patrick's day I decided to write about about the watch on the side of the blog. I meant to write about it almost a year ago when I got it, but life got away from me. Now you may be asking what does St. Patrick's day have to do with a watch? Well I guess I should start at the beginning.....

Last May I received the best graduation gift anyone could have ever given me. I opened the mailbox and inside was a package from my Aunt Linda. I had no idea what could be inside. I quickly opened the box to find a letter and a jewelry box wrapped in tissue paper. I started to read the note and for some reason the tears started to fall. I stopped reading and opened the brown jewelry box to find a beautiful pocket watch engraved with flowers, butterflies, a bird and a name. The name was Livonia, she was my great-grandmother. I picked up the note and started to read where I had left off.  My Aunt went on to tell me the watch had been my Great-Grandma’s. My Great-Grandpa Joe Boyce had given it to her after he purchased it on a trip to sell cattle. He always brought his wife Livonia home a gift from the times he went to buy or sell cattle. This is where St. Patrick comes in. As some of you may know Patrick was kidnapped and taken to Ireland, he was then sold as a slave. Later he was able to escape and return home. Years later God called him back to the Irish people as a missionary. Anyway My Great-Grandpa Joe's Mother and Father were immigrants from Ireland to America. My great-great-Grandma was pregnant with Joe on the voyage to America, she also had a two year old. They then traveled all the way to Kansas.

The watch is from 1897. My Great-Grandma then gave it to my Grandma Jo. Sadly I was never able to meet my Grandma Jo, she died of cancer 7 months before I was born. I have often wished I could have met her. I am told she was an amazing lady. She loved flowers and butterflies. My parents gave me the middle name Joy after her. They were able to tell her before she died that they were going to name me after her. In the note from my Aunt Linda, she said that Grandma would wear the brooch to church every Sunday morning. My Aunt’s sweetest memory of her Mom wearing it, was the look of love and remembrance of her Mother (Livonia), before she would put it on. Years later my Grandma passed it onto her daughter, my Aunt Linda. It no longer held time, and now the watch was on a long gold chain. On the gold chain there are two knots by the clasp, where my Grandma put them so the watch would fall exactly over her heart. 

My Aunt wrote this at the end of her note.

“Now the watch passes onto you Tressa Joy. Feel the love it carries, passed down through the generations and remember to always live from your heart.

Love in Christ, Aunt Linda”

The tears once again started to fall, because you see I was given a gift most precious. I have often been saddened by the fact I was never able to know my Grandma, but now I had something that was special and dear to her. Something she was given by her Mother. I have been doing some genealogy research about the Boyce side of my family and have been going through the family tree. Now, I have a connection, something tangible that I can hold in my hands, a piece of my families history. I guess you could say I’m a junkie for old things. I love history, I love hearing stories about those who have walked before me. I have a yearning inside of me to know more about them. I want to know more about these strong women who came before me. Women who made it through some of the toughest times in our Nations history. Grandma Livonia made it through the Great Depression with five young children. Following her Mother's example my Grandma Jo went through World War II while raising her young daughter (Aunt Alicia) with her husband in the Army. I want to be a strong woman like them. My Aunt Linda was never able to have children, but she was able to be at my birth as a gift from my parents so she could experience seeing a baby born. She wanted the watch to continue to pass down through the family.  

I have been given a legacy passed down through the years. A legacy that now I have to carry on to the next generation. 

 Remember the days of old consider the generations long past.

Deuteronomy 32:7

In Him, 

~Tressa