Foreword

                                     Foreword
     This is not your typical biography because Geraldine Foxx is not your typical woman; at least not one I’ve ever met before! I have written dozens of biographies for people over the years, though never to the extent of the one you are about to read. I live 30 minutes outside the suburbs and an hour from the city.  I have a reputation of excellence due to my skill at quickly and perfectly altering high-end clothing for prominent business professionals, influencers, and high-society - often in an emergency or with very little notice. 

     Growing up and on through adulthood, I regularly went with my grandma to deliver small gifts and visit her friends in nursing homes. After she died I found solace and simplicity in showing up to a facility somewhere travelling between my home and the city. I always looked for those who seldom had a visitor. 

     Although I was quite busy as a seamstress, I followed my grandma’s dedication and continued to visit the lonely elderly outliers - now at least twice a week. Geraldine wanted me to visit her on her terms. 
Sometimes I would be there for four hours and other times for 15 minutes, sometimes 4 days in a row, and sometimes she declined my visit for days at a time; it always depended on her mood.  I loved her so much that I didn’t mind accommodating her. 

     I started writing stories into narratives after May’belle, my first adopted grandma, chided me with a raspy voice and a boney wrinkled wagging finger for not writing anything she said down. She was a prominent psychology professor in her career and had a powerful brain. She taught me how to overcome my chronic anxiety without even realizing it. After 15 years of various friendships with lonely aged people coming in and out of my life, I became known as the “honorary granddaughter” by the staff at several elderly care facilities. I get calls from time to time from directors of various facilities asking me if I need a new grandparent.    
     
     After retiring from tailoring for the elite and realizing I had no legacy, I decided to write a letter to each surviving family of my friends explaining who I was and how I came to know their deceased relative. I included the completed story for each family and asked for publishing rights. I had one unopened letter returned to me and the rest gave me permission and many thanks. The subject of the returned letter turned out to have no living relatives, and also happened to be May’belle. I figured she would be insulted if I disincluded her story, since she was the professor who set the precedent.

     One particular response brought me to tears.  A young veteran contacted me to tell me he regularly worried about his grandpa during each deployment overseas. He was due to come home a week after his grandpa passed and was terribly ridden with guilt and grief-stricken thinking his grandpa went day after day with no visitors before his death. He told me that when he was 18, he was driving his new car, proudly chauffeuring his parents and grandparents home from his graduation and an after-dinner celebration.  About a half mile from their home, they were rear-ended at a railroad crossing and pushed into an oncoming train. He and his grandpa somehow survived the accident. He went on to tell me his grandpa made him go to grief support groups with him everywhere they were offered within an hour radius of their home that entire summer. 
   
     Under his grandpa's advice, he enlisted in the Army the following August. His grandfather was my fifth bonus grandparent and never spoke of this tragedy his grandson shared with me. His stories were all about growing up with parents paranoid about another Great Depression, his time in the service, life with his wife and daughter, running a saw-mill, and being ‘a grandparent to remember’ to his one grandson. I can only thank my dear late grandma for showing me the value of visiting the elderly. 

     I was able to publish this anthology of grandparents, Grave Wisdom, in 2021; and Grave Wisdom: Season One podcast wrapped up in September of 2022. I met Geraldine around the time I received the phone call from that brave veteran. I hope you enjoy reading Goldie Crystal’s Boon: A Memoir of Lies as much as I enjoyed being Geraldine’s honorary granddaughter.