Wednesday, September 17, 2008

Mom Mom Robinson and Senator Joe Biden

Last Sunday I was lucky enough to spend some time with my mom-mom Robinson in between cool-pool swimmin' and succulent ribs. She is a West Virgina gal who moved up to Delaware during WWII to find good work, and subsequently my grand-pop, Reese Carpenter Robinson. Originally Margaret Grey, she is one of a double digit siblings and the bearer of my proud Cherokee blood. I get a lot of enlightenment (and occasional accent) from her, and this Sunday was no exception.

She made her post-war living by making slip covers, elegant coverings to make your couch or what-not look nice for years to come! She told me a story about when she made slip covers for a young City Counselman named Joe Biden in 1972. She said he was absolutely a wonderful man and all three of his kids and first wife were so sweet and genuine. (It wouldn't be long until Biden would lose his wife and youngest child, his daughter in a car crash.) Mom-mom said that they were very poor and his couch was so rickety that she was taken aback. She asked him about material and design and what he would like his living room couch to look like, and Mr. Biden simply told her he wanted it to look like the couch in the oval office. I felt a bit faint as she went on to tell me that years later she attended a senior civics meeting that Senator Biden was speaking at, and upon his egress he saw my mom-mom and split with his group, making his way over to her. This is decades later, and Joe Biden recognized and made a point of greeting my grandmother and in fact telling her and all her friends about the couch she had made for him all those years ago, and how his son Beau had taken it to college with him.

This is just one of the reasons that we in Delaware are so proud of our Senator, and find him to be the crucial and exciting final piece of the Democratic ticket. He is the bricks in Wilmington's sidewalks, and proudly indicative of the people he represents. And that is why my Southern Baptist mom-mom is voting Democrat.

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