School Donations

This morning after the girls went to school but before I left for work, Gordon and I had a few minutes of coffee time together. I was telling him about a conversation I had yesterday that I thought pressed the boundaries of propriety.

Our kids attend a wonderful school. This school costs us $475 a month, which, in and of itself, is a financial sacrifice for us. PLUS I'm always being bombarded with fundraisers and the like. I always support these endeavors however I can. This year, however, I decided to forgo donating to the pleas for money or gifts for the upcoming annual auction.

Yesterday when school was almost over, a teacher phoned me and said something to the effect of, "I noticed you haven't sent anything for the auction. I'm about to head out and do some shopping for it and was wondering if Rachael or Hannah could come home and get a check."

I was taken aback by this, but agreed to getting a check to the school, pronto. Although I had made a conscious decision not to give to this cause, I was not prepared to actually say that in a formal sort of way to any representative of the school. I was hoping to slide my lack of donation under the radar.

The phone call from the teacher wasn't a huge deal, and given our history of supporting the fundraisers, it was reasonable for a teacher to think it was my oversight and that I really did intend to send a check. So there was no skin off my nose in that respect. I was simply unprepared to have a conversation about my intentions NOT to be involved this time and didn't expect to be so explicit. Hence I wrote a check and got it to the school within 20 minutes of the conversation.

So I'm telling Gordon all this this morning in great detail. I told him when I heard what the teacher said, I thought, "Well for goodness sakes."

I told him the same story a second time, this time altering what I thought when the teacher called to, "Well forever more."

After telling my story (twice) and using my mom's phrases of "Well for goodness sakes" and "Well forever more," I asked Gordon what he thought of what I'd just told him. Referring to my mom's phrases much more than my story, he said, "I think you're channelling your mom."

Beards and Such

When I was down south, my neice, a beautiful lady, bemoaned that she sees her great grandmother when she looks in the mirror. "Of all the relatives I could look like, why XXXX?"

True enough, XXXX wasn't the prettiest chick at the SonLight Center for Seniors, but before my neice pointed it out, I'd never thought about XXXX's looks, or her beard. As my neice told the similarities between the two of them, my brother piped in with a slice of advice. My neice of course doesn't have a beard, but just in case she followed in XXXX's footsteps, Michael told her, "Just stay clean shaven."

Females and clean shaven in the same paragraph, let alone the same sentence, are grounds for alarm.

As I've told you, my mother, grandmother and I were in a car accident. It was a cultural experience, the whole ordeal. Unfortunately the following tale doesn't capture the normal clean- shaven folk who stopped to offer assistance. There were some wonderful kind normal people at the scene, but as you know, wonderful kind normal people aren't interesting to write about. It's the other kind that practically grab my pen and scream, "write about me, write about me."

After I pushed the car up the mountain and onto the shoulder yelling, "Get your foot off the break Mama," I collapsed on the side of the road. ("Collapsed," sounds so dramatic, which is precisely what I want, but honesty dictates that I express that I really just laid down. My head felt like it was about to blow off. I simply wanted to get horizontal. But that sounds so boring, whereas collapsed sounds nice and action-filled.)

Mama and Memaw, both clean shaven, were getting all the attention. I was fine with that, really I was. I just wanted to be horizontal and under most circumstances, I don't like being horizontal with onlookers.

As people huddled around Mom and Memaw, the tiny crowd made it impossible for some to get up-close and personal with the injured. That's when I was noticed. I pulled myself - hurting head and all - into an upright position. (Where I come from, public horizontal women are tramps and I was plenty well enough to remember that detail.)

"Are you okay, are you okay?" I lifted my eyes to the voice and looked directly at the most harry woman I've ever seen. I was speechless. She had a full beard that she hadn't shaven in a few days. I am not talking a few stray facial hairs. Picture your husband, son, father, or Arnold Schwatzenegger having missed 3 or 4 dates with a razor.

"Are you okay?," she asked again. It was at the point I realized my mouth was agape and I was staring, and probably looked like I was in shock. I was in shock, but not the medical kind. I told her I was okay, I just had a headache and a bruise on my leg, which was now the size of a tennis ball. She asked about my headache, where it hurt, etc and then told me my blood pressure was probably high and that I might be on the verge of a heart attack or stroke. "I know a man who said he was okay after a wreck on 246 and that night he was dead as a hammer. Heart attack!"

"No really, I think I'm okay," I offered.

"Yeah, Harold said the same thing," she replied.

My head hurt. I didn't want to continue the conversaiton. Enter another concerned citizen. "Are you okay?" "Yes, I'm fine," blah, blah, blah. Then she introduced me to the onlookers, - complete with handshakes and all. "This is Jerry, he's cousins with Jim over there." Jerry came and shook hands and I smiled and said, "Nice to meet you Jerry, I'm Valerie."

One by one she told me who everyone was, how she knew them, and a few of the family secrets represented in the group. The tiny crowd left me for more action by Mama and Memaw. The family-and-friend-reunion lady stayed to keep me company.

After offering me a drink of her Dr Pepper, she told me in detail how she came to be part of our little conflab. Now none of this made any sense to me then or now, but she said she was at the bottom of the hill directing traffic with a flag. She had to pee, but no one was there to take her flag, "So I wet myself. Don't you just hate it when you wet yourself?"

I affirmed her, yes I too hated wetting myself in public.

My head was throbbing and my bruise continued to grow, but I wasn't in too bad shape to think, I've got to remember to write this down. This is crazy! A bearded woman, heart attack, formal introductions with the gawkers, and now talking about wetting yourself in public as if it's normal!

By now my stepdad was at the scene. As I walked to the truck, the bearded lady rejoined me. She told me I needed to get my leg - the bruise and swelling were quite impressive by now - looked at. I told her I was pretty sure it was just a bruise. "Well you'd better have it looked at still. If a blood clot sets in, you might lose your leg."

I thanked her for her kindness and climbed into the truck feeling somehow richer having experienced life of the shoulder of Hwy 71.

Excaped Convict

In my childhood home, we never locked the doors when we left the house or took the keys out of the ignition. (I saw people lock their doors on tv and longed for that life. It looked so classy to me.)

We lived about an hour from a prison in Oklahoma. Once I saw on the news that an excaped convict was on the loose and everyone in the vacinity should keep their doors looked and take their keys out of their car.

I have always been a vigilant person in regards to protecting those I love and, more importantly, I also thrived on credit and appreciation. Upon hearing of possible impending danger, -- wanting badly to be the hero of the family, -- I dutifully locked the doors.

When Mama came home from work I opened the door for her, carefully watching for evil lurking in the bushes. I told her she needed to bring her car keys inside because of the convict who might take her car.

Without missing a beat, my mom said, "If there is a criminal who wants my car, I'd rather him just take it instead of coming in here to get the keys."

Mama's Juice Glasses

When I was growing up, on more than a couple occasions, my mom tried to bring some class to our country kitchen. Once she bought juice glasses. They were amber brown with orange and white flowers on them. They were tiny -- about the size of a pee cup at the doctor's office. We thought they were ridiculously small and were truly puzzled when we asked, "Why’d you buy these little glasses?" Mama responded to our ignorant question with a "class" we were unfamiliar with. "They're juice glasses; juice glasses are small."

With the new short glasses she bought orange juice too. The glasses we could take or leave; the juice we were thrilled with.

The first morning we had our juice glasses, I walked into the kitchen and the table was set for breakfast. Each place setting was crowned with a pristine little glass of orange juice. Mama was smiling with pride and pleasure. I was uneasy because things were more formal than I was accustomed to. Mama eased my discomfort with a warm invitation to sit down. Michael, my adolescent brother, wasn't afraid or intimidated by the new juice glasses; he gulped his orange juice down in one drink. I instinctively knew this was "wrong", so I nervously waited for the fallout. But there was no fall-out. Mama saw his empty glass, smiled and went to the counter to get the pitcher. She returned to the table, still smiling warmly, and refilled his juice. Michael returned a broad smile.

This is just like on TV, I realized. Quickly, I gulped down my juice, as did my sister Stacie and my dad. Still oozing warmth and affection, (like I do when I'm proud of the atmosphere I've created in my home) Mama got the pitcher and gently refilled our juice glasses. "When you drink juice, you're supposed to sip it," she tenderly chided. She took her juice glass and demonstrated "sipping" for us.

Wanting to please our mom and wanting more juice, we each practiced sipping. We delicately brought the glass to our lips, trying to go in slow motion like Mama said it was supposed to be done. We knew we were supposed to take "just a sip," but we all failed. We took drinks. We emptied our glasses.

She refilled our glasses, but now her smile was waning. We drank it down and all three of us looked at Mama, expecting her to again smile lovingly and refill our glasses. This time she didn't smile. "Hear now," she rebuked. "Hear now" is what Mama said when she was frustrated. I never knew what it literally meant, but in our family it meant anything from "this is ridiculous" to "ok, now I'm really mad."

We momentarily mourned the loss of our "new mom". She refilled our tiny glasses, this time emptying the pitcher.

We ate in silence. The warmth, the smiles, the tenderness were gone. My mom had tried to reform us, to help us be more "classy," but she had failed. Now she was irritable and edgy.

The juice glasses didn't survive long in our house. One by one they got broken. No great loss, we weren't attached to them. We were a jelly jar family and that wasn't going to change.

Thoughts from Mother's Day

Since Mother's Day, I've been meditating on mothers who influenced the way I approach mothering and I must say it's been eye-opening even for me. Have I never thought about this before?

Like everyone, I presume, my own mom influenced me the most. She had a no nonsense approach to mothering. On Saturday morning, she would don Daddy's brown leather belt around her neck and when she wore that particular "necklace," we knew to walk the line. Mama intended the house to get clean and that neck adornment kept us acutely aware of the task at hand.

Now on Saturday mornings, I hear myself barking orders like my mom did. And often enough, I see my girls roll their eyes like I did 30 years ago. Occasionally, I'll even hear myself ask that horribly insane question, "Do you want me to spank you?" (That question surely tops the pile on stupid questions. Do we imagine our kids saying, "Yes, I think that a spanking is in order. I haven't been listening like I should Mom. You sit down and rest while I go find a good strong paddle.")?

Mama had a "mature" way of looking at bad behavior. Once while driving through a parking lot, as we slowed for a speed bump, we observed less than 20 feet from us, a couple involved in illicit activity. Mama sat up perfectly straight as if she was thinking, "surely better posture will correct my vision." As we gawked, the couple continued their groping right in front of us. Shocked, Mama droned, "Well I do declare." (That was a standard expression of my youth, yet I was in my 20's before I realized she wasn't saying, "I duty claire.")

Regularly I hear myself say all those strange cliches and expressions I grew up with and I say them just like my mom did. "What in the cotton pickin' Sam Hill is goin' on in here?" "Well, forever more." Yes, my mom heavily influenced my verbal mothering style.

Gay Heath was the pastor's wife in the church I grew up in. From six-years-old, I observed her style of mothering. She had a more no-nonsense approach to mothering than my own mom. She was a big-time disciplinarian. It wasn't a bit unusual for her to shake, spank, rebuke whatever child (her child or grandchild usually) was near her. Toddlers were expected to sit quietly in church and when she was in charge, they did, or else they left the sanctuary for toddler reckoning. From her I saw that spankings work very well to accomplish needed adjustments in one's behavior or attitude. Back then, it wasn't even on the radar that "kids will be kids" or that spankings were wrong. I grew up with a fine repetroire of Bible verses that taught physical discipline.

When I was in grade 8, I left Hatfield School and joined the ranks at Noonday Christian Academy. There I came into relationship with women who mothered in ways that were foreign to me. So as not to slander anyone, I will call this woman, let's say, Doris. For the most part, I didn't like nor respect Doris. Matter of fact, my face is contorting in anguish as I think about her right at this moment.

If there was anything fun going on, you could bet she would be against it. She was so dreadfully serious about everything, that I equated her with about the same esteem as hemorrhoids. I was quite adept at laughing, but in her presence laughing seemed about as appropriate as premarital sex. I could write volumes about her being a wet blanket. (Several years ago I had a writing assignment where I had to write a letter -unmailed of course- to an antagonist in my life. I chose Doris. I'm getting terribly distracted here. This is supposed to be about mothers, not prudes. However there's a prude article dying to leave my fingertips as I type this.)

Back to mothers; From Doris, I learned how to create mountains out of mole hills. As much as I disliked her, she taught me that everything was an opportunity to lecture on something serious. Lord how I abhorred those lectures and so badly wanted to encourage her to go poop out the broom stick lodged up her derriere. (Oh my, did I say that? Man, I think I have unresolved issues coming to the fore.) Back to mothering: If there was a child looking at a flower, Doris would join the poor child and begin to teach a lesson. She would pick the flower and dissect it, lecturing all the time about how God created the flower with such intelligent design. "See this is the pistil, where the seeds are born. Not unlike the human ovaries."

Well, guess what. As much as I hated the lectures, I admired that she knew all that stuff and could recall it at will. Now I find myself making learning opportunities out of daily experiences. I sure hope I don't turn kids off like Doris did me. Clearly she was an influence in mothering too.

In this new school environment, I also encountered Phyllis Murphy, Gwen Wright, and Ann Hatley. They were committed, nurturing mothers that I greatly admired. I wanted to be like them. Back then I didn't call any of them by their first names, but for simplicity I will now. Gwen had a belly laugh that I loved and she was so nurturing and gentle with her girls. Phyllis and Ann approached mothering with intelligence, seriousness, nurture, gentleness, and smiles. All these women stressed healthful lifestyles. They were my first exposure to health food, balanced diets, millet and lentils. They more than influenced me in mothering, they modeled the marriage of mothering and spirituality. In ways, I was awed by them. I am thankful for all their influences.

Lastly, my sisters Diane and Stacie mentored me too. They modeled "reading the experts." From them I learned about James Dobson, Gary Smalley, and other writers that taught on parenting. Those books I read were priceless in teaching me parenting principles and childrearing skills. I'm very thankful Diane and Stacie imparted that to me.

All these women played a role in who I am today, particularly as a mother.

The Day I Saw Mama Naked

I was raised in a modest home, and my own home now is a modest one. My children don’t typically see me naked, and I am quite comfortable with that choice and I am confident they are too.

My mother was of the modest persuasion herself. I saw her in her bra and panties on occasion, but never naked - except once.

My mom had severe ear infections as a little girl. Her hearing was permanently damaged. She continually struggled with whirling noises in her ears and an inability to recognize where noise was coming from.

One sweaty summer day after gardening, my mom took a bath. As she sat in the bathtub, she began to hear a whishing rumble. Terrified that the 1000 gallon butane tank underneath the bathroom window was about to explode, killing all of her children, she hurdled out of the bathtub and ran through the house collecting her children. Seeing our wet, naked mom run through the house hollering “Hurry, hurry,” made us acutely aware of the impending danger.

Mama herded us like a panicking hen, clucking, “Hurry, hurry, the house is about to blow up.” Since her teeth were in the little blue Polident cup in the bathroom, it sounded more like, ”Hurry, hurry, de houth is abouth to bow up.”

Wide eyed, we ran outside. My 8-year-old sister Stacie cried, “Oooohhh, are we gonna die? Are we gonna die?” We scrambled like obedient chicks under our mother’s outstretched arms to safety in the old green Matador. There, we waited for the destruction.

Diane was 14. She was in the driver’s seat. Mom, her hair and body dripping with bath water, stood bravely beside the car pondering what to do next. I was the youngest; I was 6. I perched on the edge of the front seat, hands on the dashboard, straining to get a good view. We girls were quiet and motionless. Michael, my 10-year-old brother who was assuredly uncomfortable with the situation, particularly our naked mom standing beside the car, looked anxiously up and down the dusty country road. He was far more concerned about a car coming than the house blowing up. He whimpered, “Are you sure it’s gonna blow?” Mama didn’t answer.

Stacie, sitting up straight and pensive, ventured, “I don’t hear anything.” Again, Mama didn’t respond.

I trusted my mom; if she said she heard the silver tank in our backyard about to blow up, I believed her.

After several minutes of no kaboom, Mama went to the barb-wired fence between the car and the house and valiantly lumbered over. Diane let out a guttural groan, “Ughhhhh”, as she slunk down behind the steering wheel.

Stacie, sure an explosion was imminent, and so adoring of Mama, hung her body out the window, and in her typical worried fashion, sang woefully, “Ooohhh, Maaamaaaa, huuurrrryyy.”

Michael was getting more anxious as the moments wore on. “I don’t think she knows what she’s talking about,” he confided, as he looked first right then left, still on the lookout for unlikely traffic.

Mama courageously went to the threatening butane tank, and pressed her head down to the valves. Stacie, her lanky body still hanging out the window, yelled, “Maamaaa, noooo!”

Our buxom mom started walking toward us. Her fearful expression gave way to one of self-consciousness. She gave us a gummy grin and shrugged her shoulders. Her toothless smile assured us there wasn’t going to be any explosion.

“Can we get out?” Diane asked.

Mama squirmed. She had more body parts she wanted to cover, than she had arms.

Finally Mama meekly said, “You can geth outh of the car. I donth think de houth is going to bow up.”

Relieved, we went in the house to find a flooded kitchen. Water was gushing out the hot water tank, making a whishing rumble sound, - at least to our hearing impaired mom that’s what it sounded like.

Mama squatted to push the awry pipe back into place. This proved more difficult than she thought. She grunted, pushed, and jerked, her full figure jiggling and bouncing, without much success. In a sudden flash of awareness, she sheepishly said to Diane, “Here, you hold thith while I go geth some coths on.”

Diane retorted, “I wish you would.”

The image of my mom walking around naked is indelibly seared into my mind. Now that I’m a mom, I understand the kind of love that would be willing to do that. However, I never go into the bath or shower without a robe an arm’s length away. I can thank my mom for that.

Happy Birthday Mama

This is my Mom with Bear, one of her great-grandchildren. December 2005.

Today is my Mom's 70th birthday. I just spoke with her and when asked how it felt to be 70, she said, "There is a lot of wisdom in this head and the weight of it all is weighing me down."

One of my personal traditions is to pray special prayers for birthday boys and girls. That's not to say I don't pray for them at other times, I just pray more on their bithdays.

This week I've been meditating on my mom's legacy to me. I've thought of these things over the years, and I appreciate them more the older I get. I hear with increasing regularity how I'm like my mother. The kids and Gordon quickly point out, "you sound just like your mother," when I'm laughing hard.

I heard Ellen Degeneras say, "I was watching so hard to make sure I didn't become like my mom, that my dad snuck right up on me." I much prefer being told I'm just like my mom opposed to being told I'm like my eccentric father. Knowing the possibilities sure make me appreciative that I've become like my mom.

Mama's greatest gifts to me have brought much joy into my life. I'm very glad these gift were passed on to me.

Firstly, Mama modelled prayer and Bible reading to me. Many a morning I went into my childhood living room to find my mom freshly bathed, sitting in her favorite chair in nothing but her bra and panties. She sat serenely reading her Bible. If you're wondering why she only had on underwear, well, so am I.

All Mama's kids are lovers of God and I know it's Mama's prayers that laid that foundation.

The second greatest gift she gave me is the ability to laugh. And laugh we do. We laugh uncontrollably and manage to see the ludicrous in the mundane. I hope to give the same gift to my kids.

Having lived in Canada for 13 years, I've come to appreciate the discriptive and picturesqe speech of Southerners. Mama gives me my regular dose of Southernisms. In 2004, the girls and I visited the south for a month. At Mama's house, Stephanie and Christopher joined us. That meant I shared a bedroom with 5 kids. As one might guess, that bedroom was anything but tidy and organized. There were mounds of clothes, suitcases, gifts, things I'd bought to bring back home, and school books everywhere. It was first class chaos.

One day I went back to the bedroom to have a nap. There was such a mess there was nowhere to move the junk on the bed. It was mostly clothes, so I just climbed under it all. Not long afterward, Mama came to tell me I had a visitor. I was still awake so I saw her, but because of the mess, she couldn't see me. She stood in the door and her jaw hung down in shock at our deplorable living condition. Her eyes slowly scanned the room. In slow dramatic flow she spoke, "Lord have mercy, gosh a mighty derns." I still laugh when I recall her facial expression as she stood there and her curious phrase.

Recently as we spoke on the phone, she told me that Dixie, her beagle, was "down in her get-along." That's Mama-talk for Dixie has arthritis in her hips. I never recognized her colorful speech when I lived there, but I sure notice it now and I smile.

Today, my prayer for my mom goes something like this. "Dear God, I'm thankful for my mom. Thank You for making her one of Your own and giving her the desire to live for You. Thank you for giving her 70 years of health and safety. Please protect her and give her a really wonderful year. Bless her and please give her the desires of her heart. Thank you for my mom."

Happy Birthday Mom. I love you.

Jeri and Bob