Happy Mother's Day

Last year I wrote about the “other side of mothers day”.  The fact that for many of us this is a day of struggle, remorse, and grief. 

If you didn’t read it, I suggest that you do.    Don’t read it for me.     Read it for your family, friends, and co-workers who need you to read this for them.   Click HERE 

This year I want to share something very UPBEAT.  Very POSITIVE. 

It is a collection of my memories from my years with my parents. 

It is just simply a list of ‘thank yous’.
This is taken from a booklet that I made them for Valentine's Day 1995

I've only included here what applies to my Mom. 

As you read these, I hope it will remind you of some things for which you can be thankful.  It's so easy to forget.

As I wrote, 
I laughed!

I cried!

I felt like my ‘heart grew 3 sizes that day’ with love for my parents. 

Even though this tends to be a sad day for me, this shows what a blessed life I’ve had.

What a wonderful mother I have.

How blessed I am that both my parents are still living and still blessing me and still upholding me in their prayers every day.   

Thank you Mom for :

·         Taking all those wonderful pictures of me in Berrytown, PA, so that I can still remember my first home.

·         planting pansies along the cellar door, making them one of my favorite flower to this very day.

·         not minding, when I was a baby, singing and humming myself to sleep – during church!

·         not holding it against me when I hid my shoes at age 3 and you couldn’t find them.  Ever.

·         going with Dad where God told you to go.  A Free Methodist orphanage and  “old people’s home”!    Exposing me to parentless and struggling children and the lonely elderly.  Helping to equip me for a career in nursing.  Helping to create in me a spirit of compassion.    

·         you and Aunt Mame teaching me how to shop for “just a few little things”.

·         helping me realize that ‘things’ are NOT important.

·         helping me realize that God and people ARE important. 

·         showing me how there is always room for 1 more (or 2 & sometimes more) at the dinner table at the last minute. 

·         always being concerned for others

·         caring,  praying, loving and taking a real interest in the ‘boys’ from the ‘Homes’ (orphanage). 

·         letting us ‘adopt’ Grandpa and Grandma Wilmart.

·         showing us how important it is to spend time with those who are alone by taking us to see them on a regular basis.  Mr. Harodine,  Miss Cheney,  Miss Schantz, the man up the bank on the Falconer-Kimball Stand Rd and others. 

·         My brother and sister, Marty and Mel

·         letting Grandpa Maynard live with us. 

·         being allowed to play checkers, chess, and Clue by the hour with my Grandpa Maynard.

·         not smacking me when you found out where the grit on the donuts really came from. 

·         for loving and caring for my Dad

·         being thankful for and proud of all the handiwork that Dad did around  house. 

·         loving me, even though I was and still am far from perfect. 

·         crocheting butterflies for my sweater.

·         crocheted butterflies and pineapples all over my house.

·         finding the funds to let me take piano lessons

·         letting us always have a dog and cat

·         praying for me.  Always.

·         living by the Bible

·         making me memorize scripture verses

·         teaching and showing us to treat everyone with respect; not to stare; and to never make fun of anyone. 

·         teaching me that life and people are often not fair -  but that didn’t give me a reason to be. 

·         not discussing or ridiculing other people

·         always being there

·         not aborting me

·         not abandoning me

·         never calling me names, never telling me I was stupid.  Never saying ‘shut up” or “Why don’t you just go jump in a lake”

·         not believing me when I was angry at you and said “I don’t like you anymore” or “I wish I’d never been born”.

·         my inability to really comprehend what a dysfunctional family would be like.

·         calmly answering or trying to answer all the ‘whys’, ‘how comes’,  ‘what fors’ and ‘WHY NOT!’

·         putting your arm around me on the back porch and telling me you were sorry that you had hurt my feelings.  Thus teaching me not to be afraid to say “I’m sorry”. 

·         acknowledging that even adults are wrong sometimes.

·         proving it by your disastrous decision to boil the maple sap into syrup right there in our very own kitchen!!  Thus causing the wallpaper to sag uncontrollably, and the paint to bubble & peel.

·         proving that Christians do not have to be sad, somber, sullen, and glum.

·         popcorn and fudge on Sunday evenings after church

·         drilling us on our ‘parts’ for the Christmas program – when we sitteth down, when we riseth up, and when we walketh along the way – until we had it perfect. 

·         climbing millions of stairs during my ‘elevator phobia’ stage.

·         being patient and non-condemning during my ‘irritable sarcastic’ stage.

·         putting up with me when I would kick you under the table, when I thought you were eating something you should NOT during my ‘know-it-all’ stage.

·         fixing refrigerator cookie dough for my birthdays.

·         eating my green applesauce, green mashed potatoes, and green cottage cheese on St Patrick’s Day.  Once!  When you left for awhile and I was in charge of lunch. 

·         letting me believe that mothers have eyes in the back of their heads and can see around corners.  It was very useful 20 years later.

·         having ears that could hear a bird three miles away, yet able to ignore your children’s squabbles so we could work it out ourselves. 

·         getting silly instead of grouchy when you are very tired. 

·         walks in the woods, watching the birds, collecting the wildflowers, wading in the creek and watching meteor shows.

·         letting me climb trees and run through the fields.

·         having faith that I would grow up to be a lady even though I much preferred fields, creeks, trees, woods, rocks, butterflies, birds, and stars. 

·         your gift of reading to us with all the appropriate and sometimes hilarious facial expressions,  sound effects, and hand motions. 

·         giving me a love for books, reading, and learning.  Always.

·         allowing us to leave our “fly beds” on the window sills

·         allowing us to have pollywogs on the window sills so we could watch their legs grow. 

·         Letting us bring worms into the house for the pollywogs after we had seen them eating worms in the stream behind the barn. 

·         agreeing that snow really does look like “spider legs’ when you are riding in the car after dark and the snow is coming straight at the car lights. 

·         apricot jam sandwiches in my lunch bag. 

·         honey-drop cookies with apricot jam filling.

·         trying to teach me to be very careful about the words I said, and reminding me that if not, I might have to go and ask forgiveness. 

·         lovingly calling me your ‘little pepper pot’, when I was upset and spouting off.

·         not being angry when I called you from Kansas and told you that we had just gotten married – without you.  I realize now that it must have hurt, but you have never said a word about it to this day.  And you have loved this farmer I married with all your heart. 

·         being understanding and patient when I would call home from Kansas and could only cry, because I was so homesick. 

·         coming to see us often.

·         not washing your full-length mirror for weeks – maybe even months – because Terry or Tammy had left their hand prints there.

·         cooking that approximately 2000# turkey that one Thanksgiving even though you don’t like turkey, but because your grandchildren had given him to you. 

·         spending all that quality time together in the middle of the night when that above said turkey pan started leaking.  Throwing salt into the oven and then over your shoulder.  When I asked why you did that, you said (in your tired silly voice), “I don’t know.  I heard it helps!  It can’t hurt!”. 

·         the life-changing experience of riding with you when we took off from a green-light, just to have our front seat sail backwards, jerking your foot off the accelerator, causing the car to dramatically slow down, causing our heads to careen backward then forward then backward, causing you to start laughing uncontrollably.    

·         being a fun grandma

·         interceding and praying for your family, children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and those to come.  Continually

·          letting me quietly know one Thanksgiving (with tears in your eyes),  when the grandkids were all trying to recreate a childhood photo of all of them on the staircase, that the picture could NEVER be recreated because Terry was no longer here and it was NOT fair.  I so needed for someone to say it to me THAT day.  Sometimes it felt that people had forgotten that he had ever existed. 

·         spending hours and months researching and creating my “Terry” book.  Extracting everything and anything about Terry from every letter that I had send, that you had sent, from every source possible.  There were so many things that I had forgotten and so much that Tammy had not known.  A priceless gift.  The best gift I have ever received. 

My 89 (almost 90) year old Mom.  Sitting at her organ.  

·         giving me such wonderful memories that I could create this “Thank You” book for you. 

·         a happy childhood

·         being my cheering section

·         being my biggest fan

·         being MY mom!

I love you forever and forever. 

To the moon and back.

Happy Mother’s Day to the best Mom in the entire world.