This is my grandmother Betty Claire, now ninety years old.

She’s sitting at the pool at the Garden Apartments in Peekskill, New York around 1959. She used to frequent this pool with her three kids before they moved into a house in White Plains. That’s my aunt Sherry in the in the red suit behind her.

Grandma is staring down a young boy who used to tease Sherry a lot. She told the little boy “if you bother her again, I’ll drown you myself.” According to Betty Claire, my grandfather was “always there with the camera,” so he actually captured this moment.

She told me her hair was very long and she needed that cap in case she had to jump in after Claire, her youngest who couldn’t swim yet.

I love this image because it reminds me that Grandpa Ralph was always there snapping photos and that my Grandmother is such a force to be reckoned with.

You don’t mess with Betty Claire! ~shared by @cameronclarkphoto