Memories of Mother’s Day

Another Way for week of May 12, 2023

Memories of Mother’s Day

This week was a special Mother’s Day for me for many reasons. You may remember my exuberance when a little girl joined our family back in February. I have heard from numerous readers who enjoyed hearing about the birth of our first granddaughter. Some have asked for updates. She is growing, exploring her world, holding her head up nicely, babbling to her mother and father, and growing out of onesies as fast as you can put them on. Soon, perhaps she’ll be chowing down corn like her mother loved, seen in the photo below:

This little granddaughter joins our three daughters as the females in the family. If you count me, it maybe begins to even out the gender count: five females to nine males.

I found a Mother’s Day card for our youngest daughter who had the baby in February. This one truly moved me. I don’t think greeting cards are copyrighted, so I’ll just share a few lines here:

“… when a daughter becomes a mother, a special dream of your own comes true. … it feels like life has come full circle in all the most beautiful ways, making even more dreams come true.”

On another note, this was also the second Mother’s Day after my siblings and I lost our mother. We all remember the year before her death when we celebrated with Mom at her favorite Amish restaurant in northern Indiana, Das Dutchman Essenhaus. My brother and sister-in-law from Florida had also driven up for the occasion, making it truly special, because he is the only male in our sibling group of three sisters. Mom loved that restaurant and was over-the-moon-happy to have Terry and Deb there. What I wouldn’t give now to take her there with all of the grandchildren and great great grands and step-grands and …. We lose count.

Being a mom is a blessing but not always easy. We are often strong in ways other than muscles. I think of my mom and the trials she went through, that we won’t go into here. At the end of life, she only remembered or spoke of the blessings that we were to her—not the difficulties. She often told people how wonderful her children were.

I’m now working on a new book with some memories from Mom’s childhood. Some were good memories, some not so good, such as the time her mother stuffed socks in her mouth to get Mom to stop jabbering.

My sister had given her some journals with prompts for Mom to respond to and write about various aspects of her life, which I’m using for this family memoir (which will include Dad too).

Mom (named Bertha) recalled that her mother was very nice to them when they were sick. “I could have toast (browned in a skillet) and I could play with forbidden things if I was in bed with flu.” Mom grew up with that fond memory and passed it on to us by also making special things—toasting bread in a skillet rather than the toaster which somehow had an especially good taste when recovering from flu.

Mom also let us play with trinkets—such as a collection of high heeled miniature shoes that she always bought when we traveled (if she could find the little shoes in souvenir shops). Each of us as daughters and granddaughters now have a glass shoe or two from her collection. She herself was unable to wear spiky high heeled shoes, because her size 10 feet were “so hard to shop for.” In her older years we took her shoe shopping, which was quite an ordeal finding shoes that fit and that she liked.

Another sweet memory she shared of her mother was that Grandma Ruth would “surround us with her arms when it stormed hard.” Like Maria in The Sound of Music!

I hope you have good memories of Mother’s Day weekend. It if is a painful time instead, may you feel God’s comforting arms around you.

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Memories or thoughts? Trinkets you love?

Write to me at Another Way, P.O. Box 363, Singers Glen, VA 22834, or email anotherwaymedia@yahoo.com.

Another Way is a column by Melodie Davis, in syndication since 1987. She is the author of ten books, most recently Memoir of an Unimagined Career. Another Way columns are posted at FindingHarmonyBlog.com a week after newspaper publication.