I heard about a recently published book a book containing
essays by 30 women on gifts, physical gifts, from their mothers and what they
meant to them. Some were the last gift they got at the end of their mother’s
lives….I won’ t have that as my mother has been stolen away by Alzheimer’s and
now she works hard to recall my name. The brilliant, funny, complex woman I
grew up with is gone, dragged away into her worst nightmare. But she has already
given me many gifts, intangible gifts, gifts of the heart.
She taught me that women are smart – they get college degrees
and graduate at the top of their class even if interrupted by having to take a
year off to beat polio. They go back to college when they want to start a new
career. They read all kinds of books, listen, and learning is a never ending,
exciting prospect. Women can whip through the NY Times crossword, in ink, in
about 20 minutes. And smart women don’t hide the fact that they are smart. If
there are men that can’t handle it, then they aren’t the kind of men you want
to know.
Women have careers, not just jobs. They can start and run
their own businesses. They do and learn more than expected. My mom became not
just an interior designer, but a general contractor, in order to ensure her
projects went right.
Women are stronger than anyone can imagine. My mom was a
polio survivor, contracted in her junior year at college. In her 40’s she lay
in bed with several herniated discs in her spine for 6 months, then got up and
went back to work, because, “I’d rather be doing something I like, than lying
around thinking about how much it hurts.” She went through 3 hip replacements.
And had three babies.
Women set standards for themselves. “If you want to be in
charge, never learn to type or make coffee. If they insist, screw it up so
badly that they won’t ask again - that’s what men do.” I had to do that once. I
was a sales clerk and the store accountant asked me to type a letter. So I did,
starting at the top of the page and continuing without a break. He did his own
typing after that. I always assumed that I could be the boss. (My sisters will
testify to that!)
Women can make less into more. Feeding and clothing three
kids on my Dad’s grad student stipend wasn’t easy, but we never felt poor or
hungry. My mom sewed clothes from Vogue patterns that were so fashionable that
they wouldn’t be worn in the Midwest until two years after they had become hand
me downs in our family. She learned to cook, though my Dad is the real gourmet
cook in the house – another lesson - men can cook and smart women marry men who
can cook. We learned the lessons of thrift - my sisters and I looked at the ham
glistening with brown sugar glaze, and saw past that, past the ham and
escalloped potatoes, past the cold ham and the ham sandwiches, to wail, “Not
pea soup!” I was left with a life-long
revulsion to powdered milk and an ability to budget.
Women lift up and give back, pass on skills and knowledge.
My mom taught in all sorts of venues in addition to working; knitting and
embroidery at a knitting shop, art in a Juvenal Detention center, and interior design
at the area Technical College. She continuously educated her design clients
about color, light, form, beauty and finding their own taste. I learned that teaching should be like
breathing, effortless and uplifting.
There is always time to stop and smell the roses, literally
and figuratively. She loved gardening, especially fragrant flowers; The hyacinths
wall of scent in early spring, the huge,
floppy, pink peony’s spicy nip, the sweet perfume of old fashion roses, spires
of iris wafting a scent of root beer, were an invitation to bend down and inhale
deeply. A glimpse of a beautiful vista, work of art, an elegant piece of
jewelry, a friendly dog, an interesting antique, were all worth pausing to
appreciate. And boredom is the realm of the unobservant. There is always
something to be learned and something new to see, even in the most pedestrian
settings. The “same” walk through a neighborhood yields something new every day.
Listening without judgment can be enough. Sometimes it felt
like she carried a sign, “Free Shrink”, because complete strangers would spill
their life stories to her. I remember it happening in the oddest places, a
beach at a campground, in a long line at the grocery store. I pass this along
by giving “out of the blue” compliments to anyone who looks like they need it. Still
working on the listening part.
Love is not biological. Of my parent's four grandchildren, three are adopted. All were welcomed and loved equally.
Mom wasn’t perfect. When she was mad, you got the silent
treatment- which was how I learned that if you chit-chat in a relentlessly
cheery way, totally ignoring the fact you are not getting a response, the
silent one will CRACK, and talk. My stock of silly novelty songs was learned
from her, despite the fact that she really can’t sing - the Chipmunk’s
Christmas Song is about the only thing in her range. That life does have a
soundtrack, and there are all sorts of occasions where bursting into song isn’t
just something that happens in the movies. She was addicted to fudge sickles
and hated green beans. She was a good baker but a so-so cook, so when my Dad
and I took over cooking when she had her herniated discs, she never reclaimed
that position - and I learned to be a pretty good cook at 12.
Happy Mother’s Day, Mom. I love you and miss you, and I will
do my best to honor who you were by passing on these lessons to my
daughters. They may never know your true
spirit, but I can show them what I learned from you; how to have a well lived
life.
