Our Parents' Legacy was created by the five children of Mr and Mrs Francis.
We are a close-knited family who have grown together through hardship and have overcome all obstacles thrown at us. From a union that started in the 1980's and that is still going strong today came forth children with the initials D, C, S, A, J and a whole host of grandchildren. All five of us through our parents' sacrifices were able to gained education and made something of ourselves and now we give that to our children, nieces and nephews.
How do we work?
For a family that had so little we grew up with parents that were always giving, giving and giving. Our father has always been a farmer and our mother now a housewife was previously a early childhood education teacher. Both our parents individually and collectively made an impact on our lives and so now it is our turn to impact the world around us.
Our father taught us the true meaning of being helpful and sharing. For many people they choose whom they want to help and share with but for our Dad it stands as an innate ability. No matter who he met he was never too busy to help and no matter how little we have whether it was food, clothing, shelter or time, he would always willingly share and lend a helping hand. At times we thought that by the time Daddy and Mommy get through giving we would have nothing left but we always had enough left to share for all of us and when it seems less than enough something else was always around the corner. Through this act of immeasurable kindness we learnt to give without expecting.
Our mother taught us the importance of education. Through her words and actions she rose above odds to become an early childhood education teacher. She alongside our Dad, ensure we always had the resources to excel academically and that we were never absent from school unless we were ill. Sometimes we had shoes that would get soaked when it rained or that we had been wearing for many years but they were always clean and our uniforms were always clean and neatly ironed. Sometimes we didn't have much eat but no one knew because our Mom always taught us to be independent and to learn to do without. At times when we would get bread and tea for dinner before bed any frown would be met with the good old Jamaican saying "nyam it, a dat me have". A true life lesson from our Mom.
For a family that didn't have much, in giving our Mother never gave what we didn't need she always gave our best to others. Whether it was clothing, food or a place to rest, Mommy gave our best. We can remember her packing up our best clothes to give to others who didn't have and we couldn't complain. We also remember the first time our orange tree produced fruits, it gave us a single orange. Yes, just one! We were all so excited only to be told no one could touch the orange. Well we had to watch it grow and hoped for the blessed day we would taste it. Finally the day of harvest came. We called up the neighbors, then our Mom peeled the orange and pegged it and gave half to her for the six of them and we seven shared the other half. It was the best orange we ever had and we all filled, especially with joy. We can safely say we have always lived a rich life. One rich in love... Love that we shared in thoughts and action.
Although we have passed the worst we never forget where we are from. We grew up in a small blue one room house with limited space, outside kitchen and bathroom and whole lot of love. To many outsiders they saw a shop but to us it was an ark for in that small blue house we rode out our storms. We always had a stable foundation that we looked to and that foundation taught us to never think of ourselves better than anyone but to always remember we are different. We were taught that no matter how little we seemed to have it was always enough to share and we should always treat others the way we wanted to be treated.
Why we give back?
WE HOPE TO IMPACT LIVES
“Five The Hard Way”
– Our Parents' Legacy
