Today is my mom’s birthday. I’ve been thinking about her a lot lately. She influences me still, even decades after her death.
She was a bit progressive for her time. Or maybe she was part of the voices of change of her generation. Those ones that speak out against the previous generation’s status quo and seem like a minority. Until they aren’t. However it’s defined, she had some strong opinions. Which is odd because in her personal life she was riddled with self-doubt and insecurity. But even in the midst of relational insecurity and personal doubts, she was intentional about what a lot of what she believed and it informed how she made decisions.
One dramatic example is when she told me, at 2 1/2 that she was pregnant with my baby brother. She explained, in child-appropriate language how babies were born. Even when I blurted out in public “How’s the doctor going to get that baby out of your stomach?” she answered me. (Although she did tell me to wait until we got home.)
In that time (early 1960s) most people from her generation were not that honest about the process. In fact, years later I had a friend whose parents had told her each of her sisters came from the garden. When her mom came home from the hospital, she was told her mom had gone to the garden to get the baby.
That example encapsulates the qualities tha made up my home. The qualities that I absorbed and nurture in my own life.
Honesty. Respect. Valuing others, while also protecting yourself. Unconditional love mixed with equal portions of high expectations.
This even applied to children. She accorded the children in her life (me, my brother, our cousins) with the same love and respect she gave the adults. She gave us resources to discover information. She provided what she could to enable us to learn and grow. She encouraged our questions. She answered our questions. She told me what she thought and taught me how to formulate my own opinions. She let me be me. And she let me know she adored me. That gave me a confidence that underlies all the insecurities that later life events instilled into my personality.
I am who I am in large part because of her input. So even though I’ve not heard her voice for over three decades, my Mama-memories still speak. They still teach.
Happy Birthday, Mama. I miss you.