Thinking of You, Mom....

The picture has faded, but the memories haven't. Today would have been my mother's 103rd birthday. As she was fond of reminding us, her birthday was "exactly 6 months from Christmas..."

Mom was born in Salem, Oregon, the youngest of six children. Her oldest sibling, Alberta, was a nurse and died in the Spanish Influenza epidemic when she was 18. Mom was eight. She had four brothers who all went to college and became professionals. Because she was a girl, she went to secretarial school. She always regretted not going to college, and so, when she was 60, she did, graduating cum laude from UCLA when she was sixty five.

I think I inherited my sewing and knitting skills from my grandmother. My mother did not sew or knit. She tried to make a bride's dress for a baby doll, no doubt fully realizing the irony of this, but it was the only doll I had. It was not a success.

She was a great cook, although she shuddered at the thought of dealing with any kind of "carcass". Our neighbors once brought over a whole 20# salmon, and although she loved salmon and cooked it to perfection, she did have to get the neighbor to come and fillet the fish for her. My brother and I often had to wait until quite late for our dinner, because when my father came home from work at 6pm, everything came to a halt and they sat in the living room together with a cocktail (or two...) discussing their respective days. Very civilized....I think OilMan and I are becoming our parents in this respect, although our tipple is a glass (or two...) of wine.

Life was not always simple or easy. I remember lying in bed at night listening to Mom on the phone. It wasn't until years later that I realized she was doing the early version of telemarketing. She was also an "Avon Lady", going door to door selling cosmetics. Not exactly satisfying jobs for someone yearning for a college degree...

She was always going to bat for me in school. If she felt an injustice had been done, she would do everything in her power to right the wrong.

She was stylish as a young woman and always loved nice clothes and shoes. Taking her to the shoe store later in life was always an ordeal because she loved pretty shoes and hated settling for the orthopedic ones required by advancing arthritis. Hope always sprang eternal that she would find a fashionable orthopedic shoe, and she was always in a bad mood when she didn't. I think I got that from her.

Mom was political, fighting for improvements in education in particular. I think I got my liberal view of life from her, if not her indomitable presence at school board meetings. She gave money she didn't have to all kinds of liberal causes. She never learned to swim and was not comfortable in the water, even in Southern California where swimming pools were common. Being born in Hawaii, I, however, learned to swim before I could walk.

Mom decided, on the basis of no experience whatever, that she wanted to go camping. She borrowed equipment, rounded up us kids and my very reluctant father, and took us off the the Eastern Sierra for a weekend. The campground was crowded, the tent was pitched on a hill, none of us knew how to cook camp food, and my brother, who was about 5, took 5 showers when we decamped after one night and went to a motel.It was always one of her favorite stories.


You left your mark on us kids, Mom. You raised us well. Happy Birthday and Rest in Peace....