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| Billie Silvey |
| Willa Myers --a Woman of Gratitude |
| November 2006 |
| She wasn’t beautiful, she wasn’t rich, but she had a smile that warmed your heart, and she was one of the most grateful people I’ve ever known. Some people might think she didn’t have a lot to be grateful for. She’d lost a leg in an auto accident as a teenager, and she grew up a black woman in the South, caring for other people’s houses and children. But she was grateful for the employers who had been kind, especially a Jewish woman who taught her to keep house well and take pride in herself and her work. Then Fred Myers, who had ridden the rails to California to find work in the dark days of the Depression, returned to marry her and take her West. There, she met the woman who brought her to Christ. She was grateful for her husband, and for the woman, who was later killed in an auto accident. Willa talked about her often, and if she ever questioned God’s goodness, it was to wonder why such a woman had to die. But she always concluded that we just had to trust God and lean on him. The Myerses began attending the Vermont Avenue Church of Christ in South Los Angeles. That’s where I met them. Deeply devoted to each other, they were a study in contrasts. She was tall and large-boned with dark skin and a warm personality. He was short and slight, light complexioned black man with shocking pale eyes and a shrewd sense of humor. Their two-bedroom house on 76th Street was immaculate, tastefully furnished with sturdy wood furniture Fred had gathered, piece by piece, from alleys where residents had left them. He had a good eye for quality. He’d take a piece home and repair it, then Willa would clean it up and polish it to a glow. Their house was warm and inviting, and they loved people. Fred liked to fish, and Willa was a great cook. Her fish fries were legendary. She would remove her artificial limb and zip around the kitchen on her crutches, singing hymns and talking about all God had done for her. When I was pregnant with Robert in 1973, Frank and I tried to think of a place to take Kathy, who was four at the time. She stayed with the Myerses, and Frank went by to let them all know when he’d arrived. The Myerses were our first visitors to the hospital. They filled in for grandparents who lived in Texas and seldom were able to come. In the photo above, Willa is holding Robert while we watch Kathy perform with the kindergarten in a program at Normandie Christian School. We worked and worshipped together at the Vermont Avenue Church, where Fred co-taught an adult Bible class. Neither of them had much formal education, but they were avid Bible students, respected for their wisdom. The only clutter I recall seeing in their house was the top of the table, which was often spread with open Bibles, commentaries and other study aids. I remember their delight when they received a copy of Josephus. Willa and I worked and socialized together as officers of District 6 of the Associated Women for Pepperdine, together with Elizabeth McCaleb, Ruby Green and Hattie Shelton. AWP helped raise money for scholarships for Christian students at Pepperdine. As the Myerses grew older, Fred suffered from emphysema. This time, I visited him in the hospital, where the nurses wondered at the couple’s large, multiracial family. Willa was troubled with arthritis, and one day she fell in her backyard. She just lay there, praying to God, and, she told me, after a while, “he lifted me up.” Being with Willa often left you feeling that you’d been in the presence of God. She used her doctor visits and hospital stays to testify to doctors, nurses and other patients of God’s goodness. After she was diagnosed with cancer, we were pleased that a niece came to move her to Connecticut. What a shock when the disease went into remission and she found that the niece had stolen her checks and savings. A nephew moved her to Nashville, where a friend, Betty Bridges, and I visited her little home. She was still rejoicing at her good fortune in having nephews to care for her and friends to visit and send her cards. And she cooked a fine meal for us. Not long after, she died--still singing the praises of the God who led her all the way and lifted her when she was down. |
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