My Mother's Hands

My mother’s hands had short, clipped nails and prominent veins. She wore no rings, save her simple gold wedding band, and no nail polish.  

On Sunday mornings she wore soft white gloves to church. Her hands pointed to words in the hymnal and passed out little bags of chocolate chips, raisins, mini marshmallows, and red hots to her four wiggly kids. With one gloved finger, she tapped out “Intery mintery, cutery corn/Apple seed, apple thorn/Wire, briar, limber lock/Three geese in a flock…” on the fingers of the nearest child. During the sermon, when a single snap of her fingers signaled us to stop giggling and behave ourselves, her gloves muffled the sound but not the warning.

 

The rest of the week her hands rarely stopped moving. They folded laundry, ironed shirts, washed windows, scrubbed floors, polished woodwork, packed lunches, pared potatoes, peeled apples, stirred pudding, and cranked homemade ice cream.

 

They baited fishhooks, skipped stones, collected locust shells, arranged wildflowers, cut cattails, painted rocks and slate and pieces of driftwood. They played the piano and strummed the ukulele. They moved game pieces, worked jigsaw puzzles, colored in coloring books, and sewed teeny-tiny doll clothes. They turned the pages of our favorite books as we learned to read, held our bikes as we learned to ride, and pitched softballs as we learned to bat. 

 

I saw them covered in flour when she rolled out pie crust, hidden in bubbles when she washed the dishes, spattered with paint when she rolled the ceilings or painted walls, woodwork, and floors.

 

I felt them strong as they pushed the back of my swing, felt them gentle as she pulled out a stinger or splinter, felt them cool on my feverish cheeks. 

 

I watched them as she turned the whisper-thin pages of her old Bible, as she graded stacks of workbooks with her red pencil, and as she confidently filled in crossword puzzles in ink. 

 

As the years rolled on, they held the hands of my children, raced Matchbox cars down the ironing board with them, turned the pages of the same books she’d read to me. 

 

These days her hands are finally slowing down a bit. They still color, play the piano, and turn the pages of books and her Bible. They may be showing their age, but she has earned every wrinkle. To me, my mother’s hands have always been beautiful and always will be.

Keep Your Happiest Face Up

As many of you know, my mom has been residing in an assisted living facility for the past several years. Thus, my sister, brothers and I have not been able to visit her since early March. Although my mom is a bit peeved by the persistence of the coronavirus, she has adjusted to the changes surprisingly well. We've all been writing letters, sending (or dropping off) care packages, and calling more often. During one phone call early on in the pandemic, Mom and I had been talking about the many ways the virus was interrupting our lives and plans. Maybe I was showing more frustration than I meant to because at the end of the conversation, she said, “Well, honey, keep your happiest face up." I laughed and said I'd try. Then I said what I always say at the end of a call: "I love you, Mom," and she said, "I love you too, more than you know." 

Thanks to the patient supervision of the thoughtful workers at her facility, we've also been able to FaceTime with her, something that we'd never done before. One of the interesting aspects of the collision between FaceTime and early dementia is that to my mom, the FaceTime visits seem like actual in-person visits. "Be sure to take your book with you when you leave today, honey," she told me one day, and then she said, "I'm so glad I got up there to see Ben and Becca's new house" (which she’s seen only on a FaceTime tour my son and his wife gave her).

The FaceTime visits, mail, and phone calls have undoubtedly contributed to the way my mom has adapted to this new normal, but I wonder if her resilience is also a product of having lived a long time and seen a lot of hard things. She was born in 1932, right in the middle of the Great Depression. In the turbulent 1960s, she was a young wife and mother.  By the time she retired from teaching in the early 1990s, she had lived through wars, recessions, political and social unrest, and disease outbreaks from tuberculosis and polio to measles and whooping cough. She was just shy of seventy years old on 9/11, and now here she is at 87, weathering a pandemic, the likes of which, none of us has seen before. 

As she has always done my whole life, she is still setting a wise example for me. I see her carrying on, finding joy and peace in doing the things she's always loved that she can still do: reading, coloring, writing letters, caring for the plants on her windowsill, praying for her family and friends, and drinking coffee. She is holding on tight to her faith and keeping her happiest face up. I love you, Mom, more than you know.

Our Daily Bread

I was thinking recently about the ways moms provide for their kids throughout their lives. One of the first and most crucial needs they fill is hunger. In fact, for the first few years of life, most of the food we eat comes from Mom. As you grow older, you start to have more choices about the food you eat and more opinions about when, where, and how you eat meals. You might chafe against the "clean plate club" rule or wish you could go out for pizza with friends instead of being home for family dinners. Then one day you're out of the house and on your own for meals, and you remember how good your mom's Swiss steak and mashed potatoes tasted on Sunday afternoons or how exciting it was to see the fogged-up windows when you came home from play practice because you knew that meant it was spaghetti night. You look forward to coming home for visits to eat Mom's home-cooking again. It's something kids never really outgrow. But twice now, with Steve's mom and my own, I've seen that moms start to outgrow their ability to provide those meals. As with so many parts of the parent-child relationship (the last time you held your parent's hand, the last time your family all went somewhere together in the family car), you don't usually realize while you're eating it, that it's the last meal your mom is going to make for you. My mom's home-cooked meals are a thing of the past. The last time I visited her in her new little personal care apartment, she offered me a cup of coffee, but she couldn't even quite remember how to operate her Keurig.

If you were raised in a family like mine, it wasn't just physical food your mom provided, she also nourished you spiritually. You probably took for granted the daily bread she provided: everything from her little wooden music box full of Bible verses on small colored cards that played "Standing on the Promises," to the familiar sight of her well-worn black leather Bible with its onion-skin pages and the flat red pencil she kept tucked in its spine for neatly underlining favorite verses, to her helping you memorize Luke 2 and the first chapter of John. As you grew older, your spiritual diet started being supplemented at Bible Club and youth group meetings, and those new tastes started to seem a little more appealing than the same old spiritual food you got at home. You may have started to get a little impatient with mealtime and bedtime prayers, and you chafed at missing Wonderful World of Disney every Sunday night because of evening church. Then one day, you are out on your own, deciding for yourself when and where to go to church and pray and read your Bible.

However, unlike all the physical meals your mom made while you were growing up, the spiritual food she provided continues to nourish you throughout your life. Over the years, you find yourself humming the hymns you heard your mom singing around the house and repeating the same mealtime and bedtime prayers with your own kids that she said with you. And your mom's ability to provide spiritual guidance extends much longer too. For as long as I can remember, every three months, I'd find a fat envelope in my mailbox containing a copy of "Our Daily Bread," a little booklet that contains short daily devotionals I've read steadily over the years. In April, my mom's emergency surgery and the aftermath that changed her life and ours ended that long-standing tradition. The picture above is of the last copy she sent me. For four months now, I've been on my own: I've had to forage around and find my own copies of "Our Daily Bread"; it's been fine, but the ones I've found are one-month versions, rather than the three-month copies she sent, and I miss finding those fat envelopes in my mailbox. Although she can no longer mail me those booklets or make me a meal or a cup of coffee, her ability to feed me spiritually has not ended. Last time I was down, she told me about how she's catching up on her daily Bible reading and thinks she'll make it through Revelation by the end of the year; she played hymns for me on her CD player. And I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that she prays for me and for my kids and for the rest of the family every single day. Some days I think those prayers are the only things keeping me standing, and I hope and pray that for as long as I live, I will follow in her footsteps and "stand on the promises" as firmly and strongly as she has. Thanks for all the food, Mom.

Never Ready

Sixteen years ago, Steve's dad died suddenly. A year later, my dad died, also fairly quickly and unexpectedly. I remember thinking, at the time, I sure hope our moms don't die anytime soon--we can't take any more loss. I felt so lonely, so lost without my dad. I felt as though everyone should be able to see the huge hole I felt right in the center of my body and my life. I told the story of his death to anyone who would listen. And I told the stories of his life to my children and my students. With time, his absence became easier to bear--I stopped seeing his likeness in people I passed on the street. Even though I've never stopped missing him, I learned to live without my dad. One of the main things that made that easier was, of course, that I still had my mom, who at age seventy, was still healthy and active. She visited often and even started calling more to make up for the calls and emails I was no longer getting from Dad. Over the past few years, Mom's been slowing down a bit; she no longer makes the drive to our house by herself, and as a result, we see her less than we used to, but we've adjusted. We go there or we meet my sister halfway and bring Mom back here for a few days. In between visits, we talk fairly often, and Mom writes letters to me to and each of the kids.

But last Saturday, Mom ended up in the emergency room. She had extensive surgery that night, and now a week later, she is still in ICU. They are beginning to talk about releasing her, but to be honest, we aren't seeing signs that she's ready. She definitely won't be returning to her house now (or ever), and we are not at all sure she's going to make it through this. As my siblings and I have been texting and talking today, I've been trying to fight the fear that's taking hold of me. At supper I finally said out loud to Steve what I've been thinking all day: I'm not ready to be in this world without my mom. And the truth is, I'll never be ready. I can't even imagine life without her. I've always been the kind of person who prepares for the future, who tries to envision and imagine what each new stage will be like and attempts (often futilely) to get ready for it. But this one is beyond me. My only consolation (beyond the biggest consolation--that this life is not all there is) is that there is so much of Mom in me and in my sister and brothers. For the past 57 years, Mom's been pouring herself into us. And when she leaves us, whether it's sooner or later--please let it be later--we will cling to those precious pieces of her that are planted deep in our hearts and minds and memories.

Getting Old

Maybe it was the back-to-back visits we had with my husband's mom and my mom this past summer. Or perhaps it was the fifty cents we saved when we went to a movie two days before my husband's 55th birthday, and the woman at the ticket desk gave him an early birthday present: the senior citizen's discount. Or maybe it's just the way I hobble around when I first get up after sitting for a while. Whatever the reason, lately I've been pondering what it's like to be old and how to get there gracefully. I've always been the kind of person who thinks about and tries to imagine what the next stage in life will be like and how I will fit into it. I used to daydream about going to college, getting married, and having kids. I paid attention to the lives of people a little farther down the path than I was and looked for tips on what I should do, how I should act, and what I should remember. So these days I've been watching Steve's mom and my mom for clues about the stage in life that my husband and I are just beginning to teeter on the edge of. I've watched them cope with losing their husbands and living alone. I've seen them give up riding their bikes, taking walks when the sidewalks are snowy, and having holiday celebrations in their homes. I've wondered what it must feel like, after all those years of feeding your family and hosting dinner parties, to lose your ability (but not your desire) to make a meal for company or even for yourself. When Steve's mom was eighty-nine, she decided to move into an assisted living facility in Williamsburg. She gave up her car, her life in Fredonia, and much of her independence for the security and peace of mind that come with knowing she has built-in help if she needs it. At eighty-two, my mom still drives (around town) and still lives in her own home. Although she may change her mind in the future, she recently told a friend she has no plans to move until she goes to heaven. Yet despite these differences in our moms'  living situations, the borders of each of their lives have shrunk. For many years, your life expands. You learn to crawl, then walk, then drive; you move from your playpen to your yard to your neighborhood, and finally out into the great big world. Then somewhere along the way, almost imperceptibly at first, life starts to get smaller again. At first it's kind of a relief not to have somewhere to be or something to do every single minute; you're glad to ease up on the accelerator a bit; you welcome the little pockets of rest that come your way. But then, before you know it, you have hardly anywhere to go, almost nothing to do, and way too much time on your hands. And you start to feel lonely and . . . old. There's not really much you can do about it except try to make the best of your little world, and both of our moms have done that. They stay involved in the lives of their children and grandchildren (and great-grandchildren), they spend time with friends, they enjoy simple pleasures, they keep learning, and they keep living. And whether they realize it or not, they're still doing what good parents have always done: smoothing the path and shining a light so their children can find their way.

School Lunches

Our little elementary school had no cafeteria, so if you weren't a "walker," you carried a lunch box, paid a nickel for a little carton of milk, and ate in the classroom. I had a Peanuts lunch box and matching thermos. In those days, thermoses had glass liners, so they didn't usually last as long as the lunch box; if you banged your lunch box around a little too much on the way to school, you'd find shards of broken glass mixed in with whatever you had in your thermos. Most days my lunch box contained a peanut butter sandwich wrapped neatly in waxed paper, but once in  a while I agreed to bologna on squishy white bread with Miracle Whip. In the days before blue ice cold packs, my mom froze water in an old Bactine bottle and tucked that into my lunch box in hopes of keeping my sandwich cool until lunchtime. To go with my sandwich and milk, I had fresh or canned fruit and something sweet for dessert--usually cookies, sometimes little cans of pudding, or if I was really lucky, a Hostess Ho-ho! I loved those little foil-wrapped rolls of chocolate cake and white filling. To make mine last longer, I peeled off the outside layer of chocolate and ate that first, then I carefully unrolled the cake and ate it as slowly as I could. Our elementary school was barely a block from our town's main street, and kids who had money and a note from home got to eat "over town" at the Amber Grill. Eating in town was a rare treat in our family since extra dollars for hamburgers, fries, and a vanilla coke were few and far between.  But every once in a great while, usually when my dad was in charge of the lunch packing for some reason, we would unwrap our sandwiches and see a woven potholder tucked between the two slices of bread along with a dollar and a note giving us permission to go to town for lunch. Part of the fun of eating over town was stopping at Kenny Wilson's candy store on the way back to school for a pack of Sprees or a strip of Zotz candy to keep in your desk and nibble on during the long afternoon hours. Field trip days usually called for bagged lunches (no lunch boxes), and I suppose I usually took my lunch in a plain brown paper bag with my name printed neatly on the front, just like everyone else did, but one time--maybe it was the year my grade got to go to Old Economy--my mom decorated the front of my bag with a garland of flowers.  I loved that bag, not just because it was pretty and festive, but because my busy mom took a few extra minutes to make something special for me to remind me she would be thinking of me when I was on my field trip. It was the same with finding a potholder sandwich and a dollar bill in my lunch box on days my dad was in charge of things. He could have just given us the dollars and notes in the morning, but instead he took a few extra minutes to do something only he would do and made a memory that would last a lifetime. Of course I didn't know it at the time, but those school lunches were doing more than filling my stomach--they were etching a lifelong place in my memory, and they were teaching me about the kind of parent I wanted to be.

Burlap Curtains and Locust Shells

Two things happened recently that reminded me of my childhood. First, I read this Facebook post by author Anna Quindlen:

"Can I get a cicada update from hither and yon? Ours seem to have progressed from deafening to loud to persistent, which perhaps means one morning we will wake to discover they are gone. Two cicada uses, one small, one great: when you drop one onto the surface of the pond and a bass comes at it like a torpedo, you instantly understand the genius of fly fishing. And when you think that this brood of cicadas will not reappear for 17 years, it makes you soberly consider the passage of time. I will be 77 when they emerge again--that is, if I am very lucky."

Second, I saw this picture on Pinterest with the caption "DIY Burlap Curtains":

In the mid-1960s, when my dad was in graduate school at Ball State University, we lived in the Anthony Apartments, one of Ball State's off-campus housing communities.  Although my mom had very little extra money to work with, she did her best to make the small student apartment a home for the six of us. One of her thrifty ideas was making burlap curtains for the window in the tiny bedroom I shared with my sister and brothers.  They weren't as long or as grand as the ones in the picture above, but they did have red and white rick-rack trim sewed along the bottom.  Because the apartment was so small, we spent a lot of time outside, and because our budget was so lean, we mostly did things that didn't cost any money like taking walks.  But as I've mentioned before, a walk with my mom was never just a walk. One of the things we did on our walks during our two summers in Muncie was look for locust shells.  When we found one, we'd gently pluck it off the tree and take it home where we would attach it to our burlap curtains.  On the rare occasions we found a locust (actually a cicada) still in its shell, Mom would tell us the story of how baby cicadas hatch from their eggs then burrow underground where they stay for up to seventeen years before they emerge, crawl up a tree, shed their shells, and begin their adult lives. So to me, locust shells have always been more fascinating than ugly--though I've come to understand not everyone (including my husband) feels this way! As I remembered those burlap curtains with the parade of locust shells climbing up them, I was thinking about about how much the world has changed since I was a kid. I don't know where my mom got the idea of making burlap curtains--maybe she thought it up herself or perhaps she saw them in someone else's apartment--but today, with just a couple of clicks, I can find dozens of pictures and posts of burlap curtains as well as hundreds of other clever, creative, inexpensive window covering ideas.  And when I was a kid, the authors of the books I loved to read seemed remote, almost magical, and not-quite-real; now I can read the wonderful, intriguing, everyday details of authors' lives on their blogs and websites; I can even find out on Facebook that an author I admire shares my fascination with cicadas! Yet, at the same time, I was also thinking how little the world has changed: people have always found unique ways to decorate on a budget and amuse their kids at the same time; cicadas continue to emerge from their underground hiding places, reminding us of their presence with their persistent singing and by the shells they leave behind.  Since I often worry about the world my children are inheriting, I like being reminded that change can be good and technology can connect us in ways I never would have imagined, but I also like knowing that some things don't change.

The Art of Ironing

I have this memory of lying on the floor near or even part way under the ironing board on afternoons when my mom was ironing.  She was watching Guiding Light, and I was playing with my Pepper dolls.  The air was filled with the scent of clean, hot cotton, and although the TV was on, I mostly remember the thump of the iron on the ironing board and the hiss of the water from the sprinkler bottle dissolving into steam as it hit the surface of my mom's trusty iron.  Occasionally, a freshly ironed sleeve would brush against my cheek as my mom shifted the shirt she was working on.  We didn't talk, at least not that I remember, but it was calm and peaceful there under the ironing board.  With a family of six, in the days when permanent press fabrics were just beginning to hit the market, my mom had a lot of ironing to do.  I remember she used to keep a plastic bag full of damp clothes in the bottom of our fridge between washing days and ironing days, and I loved watching as piece by piece that mound of crinkled up cotton was transformed.  After an hour or two, there were pants and shirts with sharp creases hanging on door knobs and neat stacks of crisp pillowcases, handkerchiefs, and napkins on the couch.  Although my mom probably had a hundred things to do when she finished, she never seemed to be in a hurry when she ironed.  As with so many things, she took her time and did it right.  I think about that as I hurry through my days, running an iron over the skirt I'm about to put on, quickly pressing away the worst of the wrinkles.  During the years raising three kids and working full time, I got into the habit of rushing through housekeeping chores, giving them "a lick and promise, " as my mom would say.  As a matter of fact, it wasn't just housekeeping chores that I hurried through, I got into the habit of rushing through life.  I doubt I will ever have the patience or desire to become an expert in the art of ironing like my mom is, but I would like to start living more deliberately.  I want to take my time and do things right.  I want calm and peaceful afternoons even in the midst of a busy life.

Perfect Penmanship

When I was in first grade, I got an "N" in handwriting.  Although I was only two years into my school career, I was already sensitive to the difference between an "E" (for "Excellent") and an "N" (for "Needs Improvement").  And since I was an early reader, I had gotten a lot of E's, so when I saw the "N" on my report card, I was taken aback.  I vowed to do better.  I was determined to give my penmanship the improvement my first-grade teacher said it needed.  It took a couple of years of practice, but eventually, one of my handwriting samples came back from the Peterson Handwriting Company as an "Outstanding" example of their method (even though I never held the pen the Peterson-way and often bypassed the "round-round-ready-write" warm-ups).  Except for occasional lapses when I'm in hurry, I've had neat handwriting ever since.  Yet, as tidy as my penmanship was, it always paled in comparison to my mom's perfect handwriting.  She could have made the Peterson alphabet cards that lined perimeters of the classrooms of my childhood.  Her cursive letters were beautifully formed and perfectly slanted.  Her printing was neat and crisp even when she was in a hurry.  But this week, I got a letter from my mom, and I realized her handwriting has changed.  I can tell she's still taking great care when she writes, but the letters are shaky now.  The hand that formed them is unsteady.  And it makes me feel so, so sad—not because her handwriting isn't perfect anymore, but because it is yet another sign that my sweet mom is aging.  Things that used to come easily and naturally to her have become difficult—things like making her own meals, remembering names, and now, writing letters.  I wish life wasn't such a struggle for her; I wish I could smooth her way, just as she always smoothed mine.  And in the back of my mind I can't help but wonder how many years it will be before my own daughter, whose handwriting is also beautiful and neat, begins to notice my careful penmanship beginning to falter.  I hope, like my mom, I will keep writing letters to my children and grandchildren anyway, even though it takes longer and my hand is unsteady.  And I hope, like me, they will know that despite the shaky handwriting, the love behind the letters is steady and true.  

"G" for Gail

Cherry Pie

Every year when February rolls around, I get a craving for cherry pie.  The reason?  Thanks to the good old McGuffey Reader's inclusion of biographer Mason Locke Weems' anecdote about six-year-old George Washington damaging his father's cherry tree with his little hatchet and then owning up to his misdeed ("I cannot tell a lie, father, you know I cannot tell a lie!"), my mom associated cherries with George Washington and baked a cherry pie every February to celebrate his birthday. Whether the story is true or not makes no difference to me--what matters is that it led to an extra cherry pie each year, and cherry was my favorite kind of pie; in fact, it was my favorite dessert, period.  The only other time we had it was when I requested it as my "good report card" treat, which I did, regularly, but my three siblings all chose apple dumplings, so we ate apple dumplings a lot more often than cherry pie.  The kind of cherry pie I'm talking about is made with tart cherries, not with canned cherry pie filling.  And my mom's cherry pies always had a lattice top made with strips of pie crust cut with a little zig-zag pastry wheel.  Unfortunately, my fondness for cherry pie didn't rub off on any of my kids.  In fact, for most of their growing-up years, my kids weren't pie eaters at all.  So lots of Februaries came and went with no cherry pie for me (unless my mom happened to be visiting!).  I am happy to report, however, that all three of my kids like pie now.  And although my daughter's favorite pie is apple, she also likes cherry.  And she's home this weekend.  And it's President's Day Eve.  So tonight we are having cherry pie, by George!

Salad Dressing

In this day and age when you can find just about every kind of salad dressing you can imagine, in both regular and light versions, most people don't make salad dressing from scratch.  And I usually don't either; I don't even mix up Good Seasons Italian Dressing anymore.  But one of the oldest and most well-worn cards in my recipe box is for "Mom's Mayonnaise Salad Dressing."  Although I don't make it often, when I do I'm instantly transported across time and space to my mom's kitchen.  I'm not sure about this, but I think she got the recipe from her mom (who may have gotten it from her mom?).  And it's nothing fancy--just mayo, a little milk, a little sugar, a little vinegar, and some salt and pepper all whisked together.  My mom used to put it on a salad made of iceberg lettuce and sliced hard-boiled egg; she served it in her middle-size silver mixing bowl as a side dish to either Swiss steak or Beef-Carrots-Potatoes-and-Onions.  As a kid, I didn't like the salad or either one of those main dishes.  But over the years, I grew to love them all, and now when I need a little comfort food, these are the things I often turn to, especially the mayonnaise salad dressing.  When I made it recently, I used light mayo, instead of regular, and organic baby romaine instead of iceberg lettuce.  And I added some diced-up Cheddar cheese.  Sometimes, if I have them, I also add some fresh broccoli and chopped red bell pepper.  What I end up with isn't quite like the salad Mom used to make, but my version is only possible because of what I learned from her.  I think this holds true for so many of the things I've done and made throughout my life.  I'm hoping I've supplied my own children with what Mom gave me: basic recipes they can use to make a full and happy life.  They will, undoubtedly, make many additions and substitutions to what I've tried to hand down.  And as a result, their lives may well end up being quite different from the way I made mine, but what they create will be just right for them.

Dear Mom

Today is my mom's birthday, her eightieth birthday.  In honor of her eight decades, here are eight things she did that had a powerful effect on me as a kid and as a parent:  1) She read to us: in the car, on the couch, in the park, and my favorite--from the floor of the hallway between the girls' room and the boys' room at bedtime. 2) She told us stories from her childhood, stories so vividly remembered and recounted that it made us feel as though we'd been there.  Not only did we get to know her childhood self, but she showed us how important it is to remember and tell the stories of our lives.  3) She taught us to notice and value the natural world.  She pointed out birds and bird calls, identified wild flowers, and helped us catch tadpoles.  Once she sent each of us into the backyard with a muffin tin with instructions to collect twelve different nature samples, one for each muffin cup. 4) She took us to Sunday school, Sunday morning church, Sunday evening church, Tuesday afternoon Bible club, Wednesday night prayer meeting, and summer Vacation Bible School, thus making sure we knew we were "precious in His sight." 5) She made a family dinner every night.  One of my favorite sights was coming home after high school play practice and seeing steamed up kitchen windows because that meant it was spaghetti night!  6) She was cheerful during hard times.  Holidays were kind of tough on my dad, especially Christmas.  One Christmas Eve, he was having a bad time, so my mom told us to bundle up for a walk.  She had the Coleman lantern, and it was snowing.  We were showing her how to do the walk from The Monkees, and her feet went out from under her on the slippery road. Down she went; the lantern flew out of her hand and smashed on the snowy street.  The four of us kids froze, fearing the worst--an angry or hurt Mom to go with our sad Dad.  Then we realized she wasn't crying or mad, she was laughing, and our Christmas Eve was merry again.  7) She made celebrations out of little things: biking to the gas station for banana popsicles, sprinkling salt on sweet red apples while we watched Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella, decorating our paper lunch bags on field trip days, dropping everything to fly a kite on a day when the wind was just right or build a snowman when the snow was just right. And finally, 8) She made sure we knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we were loved. Thanks, Mom, and Happy Birthday!

It's Your Story, Pass It On

My mom will be eighty in September, and my mother-in-law recently turned ninety.  We don't see either one of them nearly as often as we used to, but this summer we've had visits with both of them.  During each visit, I noticed something: our moms were eager to tell stories from the past to their children and grandchildren.  They are both getting a bit forgetful about the bits and pieces of daily life, but their memories of long ago seem crisp and clear.  Last night after dinner, Steve's mom told the group of children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren gathered around the table all about having her first child alone while Steve's dad was in the navy during World War II and didn't even know his son had been born.  When my mom was here, she told story after story about her favorite teacher (Mrs. Oliver) and things her parents used to say ("If I had a rope around his neck, if I wouldn't yank it!").  Listening to them talk got me thinking about how important it is for all of us to tell our stories to the people we love, especially our kids; we want them to know who we are, where we came from, and what mattered to us.  So tell your kids the things your parents used to say and do; write down memories from your childhood; and when you look at old photo albums with people, fill in the details behind the pictures.   Your stories matter--pass them on.

A Visit from Grandma

When the kids were growing up, my mom often came and stayed with us for a few days.  We all looked forward to visits from Grandma.  The kids loved having her visit because she raced Matchbox cars down the ironing board, played catch, did art projects, took walks, played board games, and read stories.   I liked hearing the news from home, having someone to share a pot of coffee with,  and smelling the familiar scent of her dusting powder after she had a bath.  But most of all, I liked the unhurried, peaceful time she spent with my kids.  I knew when they were with her, she was keeping them safe, teaching them things, playing with them, listening to them, and loving them.  I never had to worry about them when they were in her care, and this gave me a much-needed breather during those days of heavy-duty parenting.  As she and the kids got older, the visits became less frequent.  She doesn't drive much anymore and hasn't been here for quite awhile.  But she's coming tonight.  So today I'm cooking and cleaning.  While she's here, we'll drink coffee and work the crossword puzzle.  I'll hear the news from home.  We'll visit Ben's new apartment and meet Em for lunch at the conference center where she lifeguards.   We'll play games and take walks. And when she goes back home, we'll all feel listened to and loved, and I hope she will, too.

Leaves of Three, Let Them Be

My mom's passion for wildflowers often led her into poison ivy.  I remember seeing dots of creamy pink Calamine lotion all over her blistered skin in the summer.  As a kid, I never had more than a spot of two of poison ivy rash, so while I was aware of the dangers of poison ivy, I wasn't really afraid of it.  That all changed soon after we bought our first little house. Lining the brick driveway was a bed of English ivy.  It was overgrown and filled with dead leaves and weeds, so one summer day I decided to tidy it up, without noticing there was poison ivy hiding in amongst the common ivy.  I ended up with a rash I'll never forget.  My forearms felt like they were on fire. After many miserable days and sleepless nights, I finally saw a doctor who prescribed prednisone to clear it up.  After that painful experience, my casual respect for poison ivy turned to poison ivy phobia. The problem was, even though my mom had pointed it out to me several times, I never felt a hundred percent sure of how to identify it--I knew it had three leaves, of course, which I thought were kind of teardrop-shaped with smooth edges, and Mom had told me the leaves are often kind of shiny from the oil.  But just to be on the safe side, I avoided  just about every plant with three leaves.  This worked pretty well until two years ago when the plant in the picture was just a little, barely noticeable vine in amongst the bushes at a house near ours.  I don't know if I ever would have known it was there or what it was if our dog hadn't sniffed his way into it then brought the oil home to me on his fur.  A couple of days later, I was covered in a poison ivy rash--from my face to my legs.  I tried oatmeal baths, Caladryl, Benadryl, Ivarest, and Zanfel, but eventually had to call the doctor's office for another corticosteroid prescription.  So here are some things I've learned about poison ivy: 1) It's tricky--it hides in other plants; it looks different in each season; sometimes its leaves are notched, other times they are not; new leaves are shiny, old leaves are dull; 2) Even if you stay away from poison ivy, the urushiol oil can come to you--on your pet's fur or your kids' shoes; 3) The rash starts small; at first you have one little itchy spot you hope is just a mosquito bite, but before you know it, you're covered in blisters; 4) Not everyone is allergic to poison ivy, but you don't know until you've touched it; 5) The plant itself is harder to get rid of than the rash.  Experience has taught me I'm vulnerable to poison ivy, so I'm always on the lookout for it.  But it makes me wonder, despite the warnings we get from our parents and pass on to our children, what other dangers do we blunder into because we don't recognize them at first?  What other destructive things start out small but become hard, if not impossible, to get rid of once they've taken root?  What other things in life are better left untouched?
 

Queen Anne's Lace

Queen Anne's Lace has a fragrance as delicate as its wispy flowers.  Yet it grows just as well in rocky, roadside ditches as it does in peaceful, sunny meadows.  When we were kids, my mom used to put freshly-cut Queen Anne's Lace in tall Tupperware cups, each with a different shade of food coloring mixed with a bit of water.  Before long, we had lacy flowers in pastel shades of blue, green, yellow, and pink.  When my kids were little, I did the same thing, wanting to pass along to them something I'd learned from my mom.  Every year when I see Queen Anne's Lace blooming, I think of Mom and how she has thrived and survived in all the places she's been planted--that's another thing I hope I've learned from her that I can pass along to my kids.

Wild Mint and Index Cards

Early in my parenting years, I read a quote that said something like "our children don't from us what we offer, they take from us what they need."  I can't remember where I read it or who said it, but I do remember that it offered me a bit of comfort because the task of preparing my little ones for life seemed daunting--how could I possibly teach them everything they needed to know?  Yet the quote reminded me that it wasn't a one-way street and that my children might get what they need in spite of me rather than because of me.   Well, as my kids grew older and got ready to strike out on their own, the fear set it again--Had I done my job? Were my kids ready to face the world?  Then I thought back to my own parents.  There were some basic things they taught me directly—like how to iron a pillowcase and how to balance a checkbook.  But most of the other stuff I picked up by watching them.  Big things like how to live out your faith and why it’s important to work hard.  And little things like how to recognize wild mint along a creek bed and why it’s a good idea to keep index cards on hand. Did I know everything I needed to know when I moved out of my parents' house?  Nope, of course not.  In fact, there are still plenty of things I don't know.  But I took what I needed from my parents and then I figured things out as I went along.  And I have to trust my kids to do the same.

I'll Walk

"It's hard to explain how a few precious things seem to follow throughout all our lives . . ." (--Kenny Loggins, "House at Pooh Corner").

My mom didn't have a car or even a driver's license when my siblings and I were young, so we did a lot of walking, especially in the summer.   And Mom did a great job of making walking fun--we'd sing along the way, skip to a certain landmark up ahead, stop to play Pooh Sticks at the creek, hide in stairwells, and sometimes stop for banana popsicles on the way home.  When I got older, I walked to town and to the pool by myself most days, singing show tunes along the way. Later, when Steve and I were newly married, we moved to New Hampshire. Our old Pontiac broke down on the trip north, so after we returned the U-Haul truck, we had no transportation other than our feet.  We walked everywhere those first few months in Concord. It ended up being a great way to get to know our new town, and even after we got a little car, we still took a lot of walks, just for fun; we walked around beautiful neighborhoods and dreamed of our future.  We were still a one-car family when our oldest was born, so after Steve started teaching, Ben and I walked wherever we needed to go on weekdays.  Even after the other two were born and we acquired a second car, the kids and I still walked to town and to the playground and library; well, I walked--they rode in the stroller or the wagon, then pedaled tricycles, tractors, and eventually two-wheelers.  In those days, I rarely got out for a walk by myself.  I didn't even realize how much I missed those mind-clearing, thought-organizing, perspective-restoring walks until I started taking them again after the kids got older.  Later on, when our nest first started to empty and I was struggling with my sense of loss, I walked and walked and walked, often with tears streaming down my face.  I consciously tried to vary my routes so people wouldn't start worrying about "that crying woman who always walks past here."  I'm in a better place now with the whole empty nest situation, but I still walk a lot, especially in the summer.  I headed out for a walk around nine this morning; I was trying to beat the heat, though it was already eighty degrees when I left the house.  I had my iPod with me (I've been on a Louisa May Alcott kick for a while now--I've listened to Little Men, Good Wives, and Jo's Boys and am working my way through Eight Cousins now), but like most days so far this summer, I didn't get around to pressing play until I was nearly back home again.  I was too busy noticing things: a grandfather lifting his grandson up to press in the code on the garage door, neighbors chatting across a hedge, a young dad pushing a barefooted baby in a stroller, explosions of color in cheerful, well-tended flower gardens, and a white-haired woman watering the hanging baskets on her front porch--she had these great pulley-gadgets that allowed her to easily raise and lower the baskets (when I complimented her flowers, she told me all about her new gadgets and demonstrated them for me--two for $5 at Home Depot for anyone who's interested).  As I passed the White Inn, there was a sprinkler watering the grass; almost without thinking, I slowed my pace so it would spray me as I passed.  I walked on, feeling a little foolish but refreshed, and all of a sudden, I was reminded of my little girl self walking with my mom.    And that's when I realized going for walks is one of the things I've been doing my whole life.  And I'm never just walking: I'm thinking and praying, planning and dreaming, watching and remembering.  And sometimes, like today, I'm even skipping a little bit on the inside.  My mother taught me well.  I hope my legs hold out and I can keep walking the rest of my life.

Sunday Dinners

When I rolled out of bed on the Sunday mornings of my childhood, I’d find my mom in the kitchen browning the meat or chopping the vegetables or making the salad for Sunday Dinner. Before we left for Sunday school, she had Swiss steak or pork roast or beef-carrots-potatoes-and-onions in the oven or on the stove or in the electric skillet. As soon as we got home from church, she would put on an apron and whip into action, and by 1:00, we’d be sitting down to a big meal. When my own kids were young, we often went to my husband’s parents’ house for Sunday Dinner. At their house, dinner was the evening meal, a big dinner that my mother-in-law had spent much of her afternoon preparing. After my husband's dad died, we started having Sunday dinner here, but it wasn’t quite the event it had been when my mom or my mother-in-law was doing the cooking—it was just another dinner, not Sunday Dinner. Then for a little while when our kids were in high school, two of my friends and I took turns hosting Sunday Dinner for all three families, but when our kids started leaving for college, that came to an end. In the last year or so, a new Sunday Dinner tradition has been quietly taking root in our family. I think it started during football season when Ben, the child who lives nearby, would come over after church to watch football and do his laundry. For years while the kids were growing up, Friday night was pizza night, but when we stopped having kids at home, we stopped ordering pizza on Friday nights. Yet we still had a fondness for pizza, so on one of those Sunday afternoons, we decided to get pizza and bread sticks during the second game. Then a couple of weeks later, we remembered how good that pizza had tasted, and I remembered how nice it was to sit and watch football instead of making dinner, so we decided to order pizza again, this time with chicken wings. Now, more often than not, we eat pizza for Sunday Dinner. And I’ve decided to stop feeling guilty that I don’t have dinner in the oven when I leave for church or that I don’t spend all of Sunday afternoon cooking a big meal. I’ve finally realized that Sunday Dinner isn’t about the food, it’s about the memories—and for us, for now, pizza works just as well as pork roast.