Me: What is your full name?G: Koralina Rosa Mahogany Patterson(*Interesting factoid: All of my grandmothers daughters have the middle name, “Mahogany” and so do all of their daughters.
)Me: What things make you happy? Why?G: seeing my family strive makes me feel happy. As a young girl growing up in, I didnt have much opportunity to better myself until the latter yours of my life. To see my grandkids and my great grandchildren doing well in school and getting good jobs I feel like I have made some type of good impact on the world. Me: What lessons has life taught you that you would want your children or grandchildren to understand and learn from? How did you learn these lessons?G: Nothing in life comes cheap. If you want something you have to go out and get it. There is no person that is gonna bring you what you need or want on a silver platter, life just isnt like that.
Nowadays children are getting things without working for them and its a shame. I was taught to never take favors from anyone. Thats a value that needs to be instilled into the younger generations. Me: What is the accomplishment that you are most proud of in your life?G: Maybe having six children (she laughed) Six healthy, accomplished children. They were very good kids. I put my heart into nurturing those kids, and I tried to give them the right speeches Still to this day, I couldn’t ask for better kids.
Me: How do you view the idea of beauty? What do you wish younger women knew about beauty?G: If youre beautiful it comes from your soul. You can tell from just being around other people. As for advice to younger people I hope that they remember that there are lots of ways to be attractive, use your words, your mind. Beauty isnt only your face or your body. Be happy with yourself and other people will follow.
There is nothing more attractive than confidence and self-respect. Me: What tools have you used to work through the hard times in life?G: I prayed, and I felt 100% better. I remember one particular time when I was pregnant with my fourth child (my aunt) and had to be on bed rest for four months. When youve got three kids to take care of, thats hard. John and the kids cooked. I was bored out of my mind John was teaching Sunday school at the time, and hed record the lessons.
And all week long I would play those taps over and over again. The more Id hear those teachings, the more I loved him Those recordings meant so much to me. Me: How would you like to be remembered?G: Great question . I want to be remembered for someone who tried to do things in life with righteous faith. as someone who could be both honest and kind; sometimeswe can pride ourselves on being “brutally honest”, I’d like to be remembered as being “honestly kind”. I read something in an article a few days ago,it said that people wont remember you for what you said or what you did, they will remember you for how you made them feel.
I want people to remember me making them feel happy and appreciated. Me: Any more advice for us young people?G: Everybody needs to appreciate life. See the amusing side of things, and release that laughter. Its good for the spirit. It doesn’t hurt to smile. And not to give up hope.
We hear an awful lot on the news and in the paper, and it seems like its all corrupt, but I have a great deal of belief in young people today. They are our future and there are a lot of noble young people out there doing a lot of respectable things and there are a lot of elder people doing good things, too. We just don’t hear about these things. Also, I believe in passing it on.
Just a small thing sometimes means a lot to somebody.
