My mother, Nancy and my father Dad, on their wedding day. One of the greatest love affairs I know.
My mother died in 1999, at age 75. She was young. She had acute lymphatic leukemia but went really fast. I saw her in the hospital the day before she died and brought photos of the kids to her for her to see. She could smile. I told her I loved her. She was the strongest fiercest warrior woman I have ever met and the light of my father's life. He lived for 6 more years without her and managed to get enjoyment out of life (he was a naturally cheery person) during his final years, by enjoying my sister and me and our children and looking forward to his first great grandchild, and he even had a loving companion who would delight him by attending church and social functions with him (he taught her to skin dive too!) so he was lucky in love, but my mother was his whole life and our family was my mother's domain. She was not allowed to work and once told me that was her greatest disappointment in life--not being able to become a fantastic businesswoman the way her father and brother has ruled the world of business with their acumen. She was way ahead of her time that way and was trapped by social circumstances, so what she did was excel --and I mean TOTALLY excel, in everything which she DID do. And she was doing something all the time.
Facts about my mother:
1) she had her own tool box and adored it. She was really good with tools. I am talking in the fifties here, when you were supposed to be wearing an apron in the kitchen and spending the day cooking.
2) SHE COULDN'T COOK AT ALL, when they got married, as she had not been allowed in the kitchen at her parent's house. She taught herself by reading the joy of cooking and later we would watch the galloping gourmet on TV. She adored him. She ended up being a gourmet cook.
3) She had to fight with all her might to attend college, as my grandmother was very overprotective and claimed she would "strain her eyes" . For pete's sake, she had gone to boarding school and been the captain of every sports team there and the captain of one of the two opposing teams , always systematically crushing her opponents at everything she did. She had astigmatism, that was all. She excelled at her studies and went to one of the seven sisters colleges, graduating with honors and once again being captain of every team there was. A more brilliant competitor at sports you will never find, and a genius at scholastics. Note: my father fell for her "because she had great legs!" He was pretty direct in his admiration for her and thought she looked like Leslie Caron.
4) His admiration for her probably helped her considerably, because she thought she was plain. I think this was due to my grandmother once again, who was a great grandmother but was a total beauty and could be very persevering in drumming her opinions, right or wrong , into people's head. I cannot imagine my mother thinking she was plain, but I know she did. When she got dressed up to go out with my dad she was breathtaking. Heck, when she came home from the club after slaughtering someone in a tennis match covered in sweat , drinking her iced tea of water in a silver trophy cup which she had won for something or other(she won constantly), and she always glowed like a complete movie star superstar rockstar, which she was.
5) My mother was really cranky when she had her period. I had NO idea what was going on but my father would hide behind a magazine(she would give him what he called the "silent treatment"), and we would just try to stay out of her way because she was scary as heck. Enough said about that!
6) My mother thought I was slutty. I did nothing slutty in my entire life but unfortunately she thought I was slutty and that was that. My sister apparently was
not slutty. This is in fact was true. haha
7) My mother, grandmother, sister and I would drop whatever we were doing to watch Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers on TV. Anytime, all the times they were on. She also liked Gene Kelly.
8)My mother liked card games and excelled at bridge. She would save all her winnings in a little purse in her desk and that money (which she had earned herself! you see) was what she used to landscape our house, which was perfectly beautiful due to her artistic talents. She painted with flowers and couldn't bear to cut them. However, when she was entered in a flower show she always won first prize.
9) My mother flew around the country judging flower shows and teaching for the Garden Club of America.
She hand knit her own Chanel style suits to appear proper (she was a real lady) when she went off to judge. She was a very popular teacher and an expert at what she did.
10) My mother was an avid reader and liked historical novels. Anya Seton was one of her favorites. Elizabeth Goudge was another. I believe that my love of reading comes from my mother. My father liked to read too however once he had gone through all the theories of how the universe was created and all of the skin diving books ever written, he was a NY Times sort of a guy and adored magazines, which he would read and then instantly throw away.
11) My mother liked beach picnics. She would bring us to the beach club with some sort of sandwiches which she had made and ALWAYS we each had a hard boiled egg. She would fold the salt for our eggs into a little square of waxed paper. We always had to wait an hour after lunch to go into the pool or ocean. I would ask her over and over if it had been an hour. I must have driven her crazy.
12) My mother and I liked to go for walks down the block when I was four, and she would sing to me. She would always sing happily, "In the Good Old Summertime" and we would hold hands, swinging them back and forth. I was very interested in birds' nests and birds' eggs and we would look for them in the high hedges near our house. Once or twice we would find an egg on the ground--usually a robin's egg. Sometimes we would manage to put it back in the nest if it looked like it had a chance. My mother knew everything about astronomy as well. And would go ferning in Vermont when she got older.
13) My mother liked crafts; she made mosaics, she crochetted, she knit like an angel, she could draw and paint, she needlepointed her butt off, she did everything but make jewelry which no doubt is why I was able to attempt it after she died. She would have been a far better jewelry designer than I could ever hope to be and I sincerely mean that.
14) My mother and a group restored the oldest house in their town and she designed an appropriate herbal garden for it which would have been correct for the time period. Then she wrote a book about it.
15) My mother loved music, favoring broadway show music, classical music, and opera. If I heard South Pacific on our Victrola once, I heard it a thousand times!!!
16) We drove to Florida once in our new car and the song "Bobby's Girl" was on and played over and over, because it was a big hit. My mother would sing along and look affectionately at my father. My sister and I would be sitting in the back with an imaginary line between us. That was the cutest memory I have of my mother showing her love for my father. Her singing "I wanna be Bobby's girl!" over and over. As you know my dad's name was Bob (Robert).
17) My mother had the hardest time dealing with anything sexual--that is why I think I became a "slut" in her perception. I forgive her for this. I do remember getting my first bra--I insisted. She fought me all the way and finally gave up and took me to Saks Fifth Avenue in NY. The saleslady in the lingerie department wanted to measure me of course and my mother could barely bring herself to say what it was that we were requiring. She appeared furious due to her massive embarrassment and really puzzled the saleslady who thought that my mother was angry at her all because I needed a bra. It was a really confusing moment in my life and I just have to face the fact that my mother was a child of her generation and many things were not discussed which are discussed now. Again, thank heavens for our easygoing father who taught us how to shave our legs so we wouldn't nick ourselves, when the time came. If not for him, I would have really really hairy legs at this point. My mother simply could not bring herself could not handle this sort of thing.
18) My mother and I shared a love of fairies and she also loved my drawings and wanted me to grow up to become a card designer. This is funny to me because she hated Mother's Day and would have hated a card on mother's day. However she loved all hand made cards and loved her birthday cards.
19) My sister and I arranged a 70th birthday for her at my parent's house and I drew the invitation. It was a May Day birthday party and all of her friends (and they were all still alive at the time) andt heir husbands came. The ladies were to wear flowers in their hair in honor of my mother, who beamed through the whole thing. I gave her a fairy pin and my sister had to hold down the fort with my dad as I had come with my whole family and the kids and a baby sitter, but one of our autistic kids began systematically destroying every antique in the house as soon as he arrived -- he particularly liked a giant copper serving platter from the 1700's which was in my father's study. We had a great fifteen minutes at the party.
20) My father, my sister and I all had red, or strawberry blonde, hair. My mother was a brunette although many people valiantly claimed she had red in her hair. Then once when I was the lucky recipient of all 64 colors in the BIG Crayola crayon box, and was coloring, which I did daily, I had a revelatation and raced to my mother. "Mom!" I called out triumphantly! "I have FOUND your hair color!" waving a crayon in front of her face. I then said proudly, "You have 'Raw Umber' Hair!!!"
21) Once we were in Penn Station on our way to Philadelphia and my mother discovered a broken ice cream machine. All you had to do was push the button without putting any money in it. My mother, sister and I ate as many ice cream bars as we could before our train came. This was very naughty. However my mother loved Good Humors and we would race after the Good Humor truck if she heard the bell for as long as it took and buy out the stock. She really liked Toasted Almond the best.
22) My mother was very disciplined and taught us manners to a T. I used to sit and practice how to respond to invitations to weddings etc., over and over, like homework.
23) My mother was an incredible freshwater fisherwoman. My father really prefered his skin diving by far but they accomodated each other and this was reflected in our family vacations.
24) My mother loved all of her grandchildren once they reached toddler age and above and took perfectly beautiful photos of them. There was nothing my mother could not do.
25) My mother was secretly very very shy but never let people see this side of her. My father helped a lot.
26) If my mother were alive today, I would say to her, Mom, thank you for loving Jim as much as I always have, and thank you for all that you taught me about being proud of one's family and sticking up for family always, and thank you for your loveliness. I understand the problems you had dealing with sex and I don't hold it against you any more. I know you are in heaven with dad and our dogs and you were really cool when I asked you as a kid if I went to Heaven would I get a bike and you said "Yes". and I was satisfied that Heaven was a good place to go to.
Happy Mother's day to my remarkable mother, Nancy, who made her mark upon the world at a time when women of her type usually accomplished little or nothing. I am incredibly proud to be the daughter of this remarkable woman, and grateful to her.
one of my sons sent these to me for Mother's day. They bloomed perfectly this morning, and I am so happy to have them! Thank you and your wife, sweetie!
Mom
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