The Grandparents Who Chose Me
When my mom married my stepdad in 1988 (when I was eight years old) I gained more than a stepfamily. I gained grandparents who changed the course of my childhood.
Ernest “Joe” and Monyeen Hora welcomed me into their family immediately. There was never a feeling of being “step.” From the beginning, they treated me as if I had always belonged there.
My grandparents came from very different childhoods. Grandma grew up loved and supported in a close farming family. She was an only child until her brother was born when she was eleven-and-a-half years old. Grandpa’s childhood, however, was painfully difficult. He described growing up in deep poverty with an alcoholic father who was abusive. He had six siblings - some with whom he had estrangement. But my grandpa was a loving and involved grandfather, happy and cheerful toward me every time I saw him.
Grandma (who was valedictorian of her graduating class in Wilton, IA) and Grandpa (who was from Conesville, IA) met in 1952 at “Senior High School Day” in Muscatine (the city that is directly in between Wilton and Conesville). Grandma served as president and vice president of her class, was editor of her school’s newspaper, member of Campfire Girls, and active in music and theater. She was in the newspaper for winning a writing contest but her favorite subject was math. She was fair-skinned with blonde-hair, blue-eyes, and stood 5’5.” My grandmother was smitten by Grandpa’s 6’4” tall height and his brown eyes and hair. He had been a basketball player and in high school plays. His yearbook quote says, “The only way to have a friend is to be one.”
Grandma attended a vocational conference sponsored by the University Women’s Association at Iowa State University. She was invited to the Delta Gamma Sorority but instead went to college in Miami, Florida at the University of Miami. She missed Grandpa so she moved back to Wilton and finished college at Muscatine Community College. They married on April 3, 1954 — the same day that Grandpa turned twenty. They had no money and no honeymoon, but they built a life together through hard work.
Grandpa had been drafted for the Korean War in 1952 and was honorably discharged in 1959. He became a successful farmer while Grandma was a school teacher. They raised two sons, enjoyed traveling the world, and eventually became the center of many of my happiest childhood memories.
Even as an adult, Grandma remained one of the people I spoke to most. She was vibrant, stubborn, funny, direct, and endlessly talkative. She could discuss deep topics (but also liked gossip!), wore bright colors and bling, enjoyed decorating, cooking/baking, hosting family gatherings, and being outside with her flowers. My grandmother enjoyed shopping - especially for shoes, jewelry, and bright pink nail polish. She liked bubble baths and let me use her jacuzzi. She planned every minute of my visits and somehow always made ordinary days feel special. She enjoyed playing games and celebrated every holiday to the fullest - including all birthdays. She put effort into everything she did and was sincere and dedicated. Grandma could be opinionated and have high expectations, but she was helpful and altruistic.
Every summer I spent a week at my grandparents’ house and they always stayed with me when my parents went on vacation. Grandma and I both loved to read so she often took me to the library and gave me her romance novels! She also rented movies that I wanted to see and bought me music. In the mornings we watched Matlock on TV and at night we watched A Current Affair. I was sitting in my grandparents’ living room when O.J. Simpson fled in the white Bronco.
Grandpa would often work in his cornfields while I sat in the grass with a notebook, writing stories as the Iowa wind blew my hair into tangles. Grandma would call me inside for dinner, where there was almost always fresh corn on the cob waiting on my plate.
At night, I chased lightning bugs across the yard, got dirty, and stayed up later than I was allowed to at home. We roasted s’mores together, went catfishing at Lunker Land, visited county fairs, and ate at little local restaurants like The Cove and The Dairy Bar - where Grandma introduced me to my first chocolate-dipped ice cream cone. She took me to the swimming pool, the movie theater, and we helped little kids together at her Presbyterian church’s Vacation Bible School. My grandparents both taught this suburban girl how to take care of a baby lamb when they kept one in their basement until it was ready for a petting zoo.
I was never an outsider. As a child who often felt awkward, their acceptance mattered more than I understood at the time. At my grandparents’ farmhouse, I felt free in a way I didn’t anywhere else.
Grandma Hora had a gift for making me feel seen. She didn't talk to me like a child whose thoughts didn’t matter. She asked questions and truly listened to the answers. She wanted to know what I was reading, writing, dreaming about, and worrying over. She made space for me to be myself without judgment. I felt emotionally safe.
Even Grandpa, with his quieter personality, became a gentle person for me to be around. He included me and treated me with kindness and patience. He showed me that painful beginnings did not have to define a person forever. He enjoyed putting puzzles together, playing shuffleboard, and watching Price Is Right - as well as silly courtroom shows.
Their home was full of little adventures. I learned how to catch frogs and toads. Grandpa showed me baby birds and bunnies in nests. We rescued a stray kitten from a cornfield, and later a matted black poodle mix that wandered onto their property starving. They found the dog a permanent home in town a year later.
Whether at that farmhouse or the new one they designed and moved into when I was seventeen, I didn’t worry about fitting in or whether I was somehow failing at being a person. I was simply Andrea — and that was enough.
Then, in May 2020, after a stroke, Grandma was never the same. She entered a nursing home and, because of the COVID-19 pandemic, I visited her outside for her eighty-sixth birthday that September. I spent the night at her house but it felt strange being there without hearing her voice in every room. When I left, I didn’t realize it would be my final goodbye to Grandpa.
Two months later, he contracted COVID. After hospital stays and rehabilitation, he moved into Grandma’s nursing home in December 2020. Thankfully, they were able to spend three final weeks together — including Christmas and New Year’s — eating meals side-by-side and holding each other’s hands again. Grandpa passed away from kidney failure on January 20, 2021. Grandma followed on February 11, 2024 at the age of 89.
Their absence is still noticeable. When summer arrives and the Iowa heat fills the air, memories come rushing back, such as riding in Grandma’s red car while she chewed gum and gripped the steering wheel with rings on every finger. She always wanted me there; I was never included out of obligation.
Joe and Monyeen Hora were not related to me by blood. But they helped teach me one of the most important lessons a child can learn: That I was worth loving exactly as I was.
