"Tell us a story, Grandma! Tell us a story!" My brother and I were tucked in tight under layers of warm sheets and blankets, the way grandchildren on cold Alaskan nights are apt to be. Topping it all off was a big down comforter that in its benign airiness seemed to keep from us all the worries of the world. Aric and I were full of that last-moments-of-the-day excitement, and begged our grandma with 'pretty pleases with whipped cream and cherries on top' to tell us a bedtime story before we would finally give in to sleep.

I don't ever remember asking Grandma to read us a book before we fell asleep. The thought never crossed my mind. Grandma's vibrant stories were better than any written down. Cuddled up next to her, my bouncy childhood energy was forgotten, as tales always full of fantasy, excitement and adventure awed me. Sometimes she asked what we wanted the story to be about, and spun us a tale to our exact liking. Lying there in her comfy, sheltering bed, her voice took us away on fantastic journeys filled with wild horses, time travel, coarse haired mammoths, and brave little boys and girls.

Sometimes Grandma told us about her childhood, growing up on a farm in hot, dry, Oklahoma. These stories were no less absorbing than her made-up ones. It seemed to me, a six-year-old girl who pined daily, (and unsuccessfully) for a pet, that to live on a farm, surrounded by animals of every shape and size would be a heavenly sort of bliss. Her stories of the choking dust bowl, of the lean years of the depression, and of cooking, cleaning and ironing for a household full of men all by herself didn't impress on my mind then how hard it must have been for her. The stories of my grandma, Virginia's, life intertwined with the impossible adventures she would tell us. My grandma's story became a tale to me, one that intrigued all the more because even when it seemed the most impossible, I knew that it had that singular glimmer of truth.

Of all the adventures that she had lived through, and all the people from her life that my grandma told me about, the one person who always remained the most fascinating, the most tantalizing to me as the years went by, was her own mother. On those quiet nights, listening to her speak about her incredible mother, I didn't realize then the legacy that she was giving me, or the questions that I would have later, when no one would be there to answer them.

Grandma always referred to her mother as America Belle. It was almost as if the simple affectionate name of Mom was just not enough to hold her in my grandma's memory. If I listened very closely to my grandma as she spoke her long-lost mother's name, I wonder if I heard the mixture of love, admiration, regret, and loneliness hidden in those few syllables. America Belle -- a distinctive name, a name with strength and beauty standing solid in it. But to me, a name just out of reach, just far enough away that I don't know if I'll ever understand all it means.

To me, America is this almost superhuman figure, capable of overcoming anything, a kind of female John Henry. The stories about her life that my grandma told me impressed this idea deep into my mind. Even now, I have a hard time placing America as simply a woman, a person who struggled with life like everyone does. She seems more like a heroine in a fable -- a grand story that doesn't end with her, but stretches on, encompassing my grandmother, and my own mother, touching even me now-and makes me wonder where I fit into it. Perhaps I will only know once I have lived my own life, and can look back on the places and persons I've been.

America was a farmer's wife, strong and steady. She was not an ordinary woman, especially for her time. She worked hard out in the fields with her husband, a man standing in the darkness of my memories, whom I know only as a faceless Farmer Lemon. I cannot see my great-grandma marrying someone who could not see her as an equal, who could not stand firm along side her. I wonder what it was about this man that caused my great grandmother to love him. He was a tough man, but I remember being told any time he would get hurt in the fields, even if it was just a scratch, Farmer Lemon would stop his work and yell out in his deep, loud voice for America to help him.

I recall a few stories about my great-grandmother, but always a certain incident comes up first in my mind when I think about her. The United States was in the midst of World War One, which was then called the Great War, and soldiers were desperately needed. The small farming community in which the Lemons lived was not immune to the effects of the draft. The government must have been hard pressed to have to draft a farmer with a growing family, but as grandma would explain, it wasn't because of the government, but because of the wily local official W.O., who held a long-standing rancor against my great-grandparents, that my great-grandfather's name was put up on the draft board. For on this morning, as the fretful women gathered around the newly posted draft listings, there, unexpectedly, was Farmer Lemon's name among those to report for duty.

I doubt it took very long for America to hear the news of what W.O. had done, or to decide what to do about it. Here America Belle Lemon, my great-grandmother, shows the strength of personality that she alone possessed, and I become immersed in her tale. I can see her so clearly, rushing to the barn and pulling back the cumbersome door, heedless of the splinters biting into her skin and the weighty heat roiling at her dusty skirts. Her scouring gaze falls upon the heavy black bullwhip coiled and hung so carefully against the back wall.

As she pulls it off the wall, she feels the familiar weight, the worn handle pressing into her palm. Determined now, she runs to the front drive where the family's car is parked and throws the whip into the passenger seat. Not stopping to tell her husband where she is going or why, she starts the protesting engine, and, without a second's pause, roars off down the worn dirt road to town, leaving only a cloud of light brown dust behind for her husband to ponder over.

As she speeds over the rut-filled road, the bullwhip jumps and slides across the hot leather seat. It seems almost alive, the slick leather coils moving expectantly underneath their light coating of dust, like a dusky snake waiting to strike. Dark tendrils of America's hair escape their braided confinement and whip around her face in the warm wind rushing past. But America's thoughts are on her husband, the war, and that nasty W.O.

When America arrives in town, people stop what they are doing, and watch her actions inconspicuously. They know of her temper, and everyone has the draft board's frightening list of names on their minds. The women who have already read and reread the board watch as America marches up to the list, and with a tanned and callused finger locates her husband's name. Some whisper to each other as they see no expected tears or outcry, but only a stony and frightening look come across her features.

America disappears for a moment inside the draft office, and comes out with W.O., who looks a bit peaked and trembly as he stands next to her. She shows him the mistake on the board- her husband's name, a farmer's name, included with those commissioned go to war. Mustering up every scrap of courage in his deceitful frame, he brazenly tells her that it is no mistake, but that it is her husband's God-given duty to fight for his country. He watches with a sense of amazement and pride as she turns and walks to her car. Had he won? Had he finally defeated this amazon of a woman and her obstinate husband?

Oh, how Mr. W. O. must have quailed when he laid eyes on the object that America pulled out of the front seat. With a resounding crack the bullwhip stretched out through the air, and W.O. felt a quick breeze next to his right ear. He watched in dismay as America Belle walked up to him again, trying hard to keep from staring at the dark whip held dangerously in her strong hands. Women shouldn't have hands like that, he thought to himself, uselessly. "Now listen here, W.O. I believe that you would find it in your benefit if you should correct your mistake in putting my husband's name on your list." America spoke lowly, commandingly. W.O.'s mouth filled with a bitter taste. He hated this woman, but more than that, he was dead scared of her.

W.O. did then what all cowards do when faced with someone stronger than they are. He ran. He ran like there was no tomorrow, as fast as his skinny legs could take him. All he could think was to get to his house - to safety. A place with a door he could lock. But a disconcerting sound cut through his thoughts. It was the sound of a motor coming suddenly to life. W.O. felt a heavy pit of fear form in his stomach, as if all his breath had left him. But he couldn't stop running. Soon, he saw America's car, smelling of burnt oil and exhaust pulling out in front of him, cutting him off. He tried to escape around her car, but she was ready for him.

Plying that bullwhip with a skill born of years of practice, she snapped it hard against his backside. It didn't take much to bring down W.O., and that sure did it. W.O. was a beaten man. America forced him up off the ground, and chased him back to his office, where he promptly corrected his list's inaccuracy. After she made sure everything was as it should be, America Belle tossed her whip back into the car, got in, and as the dumb-struck townspeople looked on, drove back to her farm and her farmer, who was still waiting and wondering where she had gone off to.

A story like that you just cannot forget, and I wonder how many times my own grandma asked someone to tell it to her. She must have cherished such stories about her mother greatly, because America died when my grandma was only fifteen years old. My great-grandmother's story is one of incredible feats of willpower and strength, but it is also one of tragedy. America Belle did not live long enough to ever know what happened to her daughter Virginia. It seems almost impossible to me that she could have died so young, fallen to a sickness when she had withstood so much.

America Belle loved her family intensely. While she was alive she did all she could to make sure her children had the chance to make the most of their lives. Once, when their house caught on fire, the only thing she tried to save was my grandma's piano, for she knew that Virginia's future could depend on it. The house burned to the ground, but America pushed and pulled that cumbersome piano out all by herself. Virginia later majored in music in college and made a living teaching piano all her life.

After America died, my grandma, now the only female of the family, had all the burdens and responsibilities that her mother used to bear fall upon her young shoulders. But my grandma did not break, no, she grew up strong and resilient, like her mother.

My mom was the only daughter that my grandma had. She was Virginia's third and last child, her baby. My grandma did everything she could to help my mom thrive, encouraging her aptitude for dancing by scrounging up what little money she had to pay for all sorts of dance lessons. Once, as I flipped through an old photo album, I found a stack of old programs and newspaper clippings, beginning to turn brittle. I looked through them and found that they were from recitals and performances of all kinds that my mother had danced in when she was younger. Grandma had saved them all those years, reminders of the careful love and affection she held for her daughter.

Grandma constantly worried over my mother though, and was always afraid of her precious little girl getting hurt or killed. Perhaps she remembered how much it hurt to lose her mother, and couldn't bear the thought of losing her only daughter also.

My own mother never knew her grandma, America. What she does know about her she knows the same way I do -- through stories from Virginia. I wonder, if America Belle had lived a long, full life, would my mother have memories of bedtime stories from her grandma, like I do from mine?

My grandma died over a year ago, when I was 16. Now I have begun to realize that there are so many questions I should have asked her while she was still here, all the ways I should have appreciated her. But like finding real answers, finding the right questions to ask takes time, and I didn't know how little I had. I wonder if, as my grandma grew up and began to make her own life, she thought longingly about her lost mother, wishing she could have learned more from her, known her better, told her what a difference she made to her.

Even though there is much I feel missing because my grandma is gone from my life right now, the memories from the years that I did have her presence beside me I hold tight to. One of the greatest gifts my grandmother gave to me was teaching me the language of music, and I think of her every time I touch the smooth, familiar keys of the piano she taught me on as a child and eventually left to me.

Thinking about my grandma's life and about the life of her amazing mother, encourages me to make the most of the life I am living. I hope I can weave my story, whatever it may turn out to be, into something that will enrich theirs, so that when I see them again someday, we will have a really magnificent tale to tell.