Mother’s Day Musings

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Home, motherhood, Mothers-Day

Tomorrow is Mother’s Day, a holiday we are all supposed to send or give love and thoughts  to our Mothers.  Seeing I am a mother I like this idea! Hey, cards, a gift, dinner, I enjoy being remembered.  Or, maybe we aren’t remembered, it happens.  Children have different beliefs, priorities, lives filled to the brim with their own activities and possibly a  mother you simply know is there and the day passes by.  Your mother loves you, or she does not.  Chances are if she does you’re one of the ones more likely to forget the day, she is not going to disown you 🙂

I remembered my mother this Mother’s Day, likely for the last time, I sent her flowers. My conversation with her today while  I was looking in my dressing room mirror;  I don’t relish looking at myself and being reminded where I am on the timeline of life, I was paying attention to my reactions, my expressions responding to my mother’s happy observations outside her window (the bird feeders), I wanted to ‘see’ (literally)  my reactions to my mother’s softly spoken (weak) words, hear about the  flowers inside her house and who had visited yesterday. Her world is small these days but she has accepted that and does delight at the bloom of a hibiscus that opened today, blooming on a plant she told her caregiver to get rid of, it was ugly.  That too is my mother.  The plant seems to have survived, not everything escapes my mother!

Mother had a little boy and his uncle visit yesterday.  The uncle is a  young man she had worked with and he wanted to pay his respects, the little guy is his nephew, just a mite of a boy and not excited to visit an elderly, very sick woman, whom he didn’t know and in a strange house.  Mother had dripped soup on her blouse when eating and wasn’t certain she wanted anyone to see her in such a ‘mess’.  This too is my mother, you do not get dirty!  If you do you fix it!

After she remembered who her visitor was (please take off his hat so she could get a good look), she worked with dozens of young people her years at The Dogpatch, a Munising Michigan well known restaurant.  My mother enjoyed working with the ‘kids’ each one of the employees as they came and went;  it seems they all remember her and like to pay her visits, they did before she wasn’t well, so these are not sick calls.  The young people she worked with in her 60’s and 70’s gave her energy, kept her up with what was happening in Munising, she would say they kept her young.  And her steel like personality garnered her respect, her work ethic perfect,  and she can be great fun.  She worked when most people would have been more than happy to give it up; she worked because she liked the job, the people she worked with and being occupied was important to her. She was a working woman all of her life.   Being raised in the depression having extra money to set aside certainly didn’t make her unhappy!

Mother took a liking to the little boy who visited yesterday.  He is an endearing little guy and she wanted him to feel comfortable at her house, not wanting him to leave immediately, just as he arrived.  So my mother, the woman who allowed no one to touch anything under threat of who knows what (most likely nothing but a dirty look, I’ve not been ‘hit’ in my life) she was a firm woman, still is, don’t touch!  She encouraged this little guy to please touch, pick up, and enjoy or explore the multitudes of things she has in her home that give her pleasure.  What he enjoyed was a clear glass globe with birds flying around as it played a tune.

While I was busy listening, looking in my mirror I heard a different mother, not changed, people rarely change, but one that was appreciative of a little boy, wanted to make him comfortable in her world, even if she had spilled soup on her blouse.  The spilled soup could have been a door barred from entrance at one time.  Yesterday it didn’t really matter other than it crossed her mind.  What will become of the little boy seemed paramount on her mind and what a gentleman his uncle is.

It is mindful for us  to remember on days when cards are often mushy and don’t fit our situations,  don’t come close to our feelings or relationships, that there is good in almost all people.  find a blank card, write your own feelings and thoughts, most of us even if childhood was difficult can remember a good thought, a memory that was loving, kind and represented our mother in a good light.  We are here!  If nothing else we can offer a big thank you for a mother who cared for our needs, gave us life.  That is the gift our Mother’s have given us. And for that I am grateful 🙂

Why Blog, Why Write?

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literature, world today

To blog or write (are they the same), that is the question.  I’ve given this question a great deal of thought, I have a tendency to over think.  What sometimes seems an impulsive decision to someone else is something I’ve more than likely been pondering for ages.  On occasion I share my perceived dilemma with another, someone who’s opinion I respect and value, but not always.  There are times you follow your own instincts and carry on.

Why does a person start a blog? Why do people write books?  One  must expect someone is going to read it, our words, our opinions, our thoughts, knowledge on a certain topic, our creativity, whatever the topic of the book, the blog.  I found myself wondering why do I think I have anything to say, share or expound on that other people might want to read!  And then even promote it! Seemed rather self-serving and ‘looking for attention’ kind of an adventure. What’s left of those thoughts is:  I really enjoy writing, even if it’s not profound or going to change the world.

Today we live in a world where social media has become a way of communicating, a way of life, blogging certainly is social media and a way of sharing our thoughts, although at times like all good things extremes happen.  Look at Facebook, I’m afraid I don’t have 498 friends, I don’t know 498 people!  I have a handful of friends, my family and people I’ve lost touch with and this enables me to stay in touch, so used properly it’s a good thing ( I sound like Martha Stewart).  And I do enjoy following my children’s friends and see (is that creepy?)  as they become interesting (most of the time) adults and sometimes parents themselves. It’s an easy leap from Facebook to writing a blog, technology, which I’ve always loved, makes it very easy.  Everything you have is at your fingertips and instructions make even a novice like me able to come up with something that’s easily read.  Getting people to read, to follow, is another story, I do have some friends

The Helicopter Spies (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

that are still concerned if they read my blog  a world-wide network of spies will find them!

Some people who write a blog are planning to write a book.  I have no intention of writing a book (never say never).  I don’t have the ability to make up characters and complicated plots.   The abilities of writers is amazing; how a tidbit mentioned in passing at the beginning of the book somehow ties in to the very essence of the story or plot.  So many talented writers and so many topics and styles of writing;  books are wonderful!

My writing could only come from what I ‘know’, what I’ve experienced in life, people I’ve met, enjoyed, disliked, or simple observation of life.  After 65 years you tend to learn a lot about people, yourself and how life takes us on paths we’ve not expected.  At times we  meet people whose lives seem  to be always the same, they live and through good fortune or choices made, their life seems a ‘cakewalk’.  I don’t believe anyone’s life is a ‘cakewalk’.  Truthfully all of us have a life worthy of a good story.  That’s the problem I find if I were to ‘really write’.   I am left to write the truth!

It would be easy to offend someone, it’s difficult to disguise a person in a story of life, they know who they are. You’ve then hurt someone or maybe many others. Even if there is a good story sitting right in front of you, maybe more than one, waiting to leap on to the pages and you expose it to the world (perhaps world is an exaggeration).  What have you done?  If you are not famous perhaps only a handful of people will read or care, if you write and you’ve done a fair to middling job of writing what will be your reward or punishment?  Will it have been worth your poetic license to write about people you knew/know?  Does this mean we can only write about people who are dead?  And how long do they have to be gone before we can ‘not hurt’ anyone who cared about them?

Writing ‘vanilla’ is a term that I’ve heard.  It’s safe, it touches the surface of the story, and it doesn’t dig deep into the soul of what drives the characters to behave as they do.  There are times that finding out the unsavory secrets of a persons past shines a light who they’ve become and why. The truth helps us to decide if we care or understand a person/character.   I like this form of story telling, it helps us to understand human nature, what makes us tick and sometimes not tick so well.   It is how I would like to write if I were to write a book.  I’d like to tell the truth and nothing but the truth so help me god. And of course use a little poetic license!

In the meantime I will continue to write my blog.  It’s bits and pieces of what I know and enjoy and sometimes it even comes close to the ‘real’ truth.  As for what do I get out of it, I enjoy writing, I enjoy the communication, I enjoy hearing from other people and I have a place to share and use my mountains of photographs.  I will continue, at least for now to write a ‘vanilla’ blog 🙂

My Tattered Companion

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advice words, kahlil gibran, literature, spirituality, writing

This is my tattered and well used copy of Kahlil Gibran‘s The Prophet.  I’ve had this book since 1995, not that long as far as book ownership goes but as anyone can see by its condition, it’s well used.  It stays near my bed, close at hand for the times I may need a little advice, words to get me back on the right path.  Some have their bible, I have this.

The Prophet was given to me by a lifelong and very good friend at a time when reading the label on a soup can was about as much reading as I could absorb.  Considering its source I knew this was a book I needed to ‘work on’.  Each night I would read a bit, maybe the introduction, the front cover, the back cover, the introduction one more time, it seemed so difficult.  I would begin again the next night, reading the same things over again.  This went on for a several weeks, hard to understand, there are times our minds are that numb.  Absorbing anything of value isn’t possible. Eventually a few phrases made sense so I kept on.  It was a long process.

This book, along with a handful of friends and some professional help gave me the strength and ability to find a purpose, a reason for each day, reasons for what living really is.  It explained where I might be self-serving, what it meant to give of myself, to truly not be selfish, to  love my family, a husband, a partner,  to suffer and  feel pain with  dignity, how high joy may soar.  All chapters all of Gibran’s thoughts on life, love, death, children, friendship meant something to me.  I’ve read and re read this book more times than I care to count, and I will continue to.  I’ve given this book as a gift to many people, for many reasons.  Sometimes a death in a family, a new baby, a relationship problem, a marriage, countless reasons.  It is a book written as a view of life, one that I find ‘religion’, my religion.  This is my opinion of this writing,  the book has been published  a very long time and still sells countless copies in many forms.

I am not a fan of ‘self help‘ books, they often give ‘us’ permission to behave poorly and not be responsible, this book doesn’t do that.  This is not-self help, this is a way of life.  I’ve used the passages in my marriage vows and I’ve repeated them to friends many times over the years I’ve come to appreciate and find the value In Kahlil Gibran’s writing.  Do give it a read; its not meant as an entertaining book, or read at one sitting, its meant to  read absorbing each topic, each chapter with an attempt to understand  all it’s passages and thoughts.   Hopefully if you need direction or strength, encouragement  or simply a  fresh view  living your life, you will find this a book to love as I do.  And I thank my dear friend who gave me my tattered copy 🙂  I believe her’s is as well used as mine.

Life Isn’t Always Without Thorns

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carol jean, Child, cousin ed, Death, horrible accident, memories of my life, Memory, Michigan, Mother, Parent, sister carol, stage cancer, Trudy, Washington

Today I’m writing what is on my mind and in my heart.  The personality I ‘use’ to greet the world on a general basis, is cordial, friendly and polite, as a general rule I enjoy people.  Like most people I am complicated, not more  so than others, all people are such a mix of qualities; I’m not certain all of us have public and personal personas, that we are able to call upon for different situations, I do have those ‘people’ that I can become, for a little while; come back to my real self when ‘that person’ is no longer needed.

Today I’m introspective Trudy.  Events beyond my control (as events often are) have taken place and are going to take place and I’ve found myself going back in time, remembering, digesting over again my life and history. The people who I’ve loved,  wondering if the memories I have are correct (sometimes memories need confirmation). I’m finding through conversations with my mother that most of my memories are correct.

My mother has been critically ill for several years.  She has been an extremely physically healthy woman, partly due to taking excellent care of herself and she is a strong woman, a survivor in a world that wasn’t always kind.  The very fact that she is living with this illness and it hasn’t yet taken her is because she is/was so healthy and strong.  Now her time is closing in, end stage cancer doesn’t leave survivors.  Needless to say all the memories of my life with my mother and my father are in my thoughts much of the time.

My cousin Ed Oas, who I was very close to as child,  and I was able to renew our friendship in recent years,  died last week.  He wasn’t expected to die, his sister Carol Jean and I thought he’d die a very old man like we all hope to.  Ed’s life, like my mother’s wasn’t always easy.  Carol Jean and Ed’s parents were killed in a horrible car accident on their way to a new home.  That is when our separation began, across a great country, which then seemed so large and so far and difficult for me to comprehend the real distance.  The pain for the remaining families and the little orphaned children was by some, almost unbearable, including my mother.  Her beloved little sister Marion (Pee Wee) was dead along with her equally loved husband Billy Oas.

My mother wasn’t well at this time (in the 1950’s this was described as having ‘nerve problems’), losing her sister only added to the abyss I know she felt she was in, she has explained it to me.  It would take her many years to recover.  But there were whispers, Carol Jean and Ed, where would they live, I thought I remembered my parents discussing taking them, adding  to their only child two more children that they both loved.  I’ve recently been able to confirm this muddled memory with my mother, it wasn’t something I dreamed it was correct.  Many other people were involved in the decision, and my mother, I believe now, bravely knew she wasn’t able to care for more children, not with her state of mind.  Carol and Ed (Peanut) were to live with their Oas grandparents in the state of Washington.  That didn’t make it easy for a family in Michigan with modest means to see or build relationships, the distance seemed to far, or maybe there were other reasons, I don’t know. The other side of that is that the children did have family in Washington.

Eddy will have a memorial June 2nd in the town he called home, Monroe Washington.  Carol has planned his formal memorial, and adding to this his friends want to celebrate his life with Carol Jean and the rest of the Oas family that still live in that part of Washington area.  I will be there, I will celebrate with his friends whom I do not know, and with Carol Jean who has become across the miles, visits and memories like the sister I almost had. Almost, at least in the mind of an eight year old who heard whispers and tremendous grief.  Children are always listening, a lesson for us all, children can understand to a degree depending on their age,  if not told they develop their own memory,  and it may take 50 years to find the truth.

This entry is about two people, my thoughts and feelings of loss for the unexpected  death of my cousin Ed, the impending death of my mother. Knowing that my mother is dying, does not make it less difficult, we’ve had a complicated relationship,  her life has been full, she made her life what it is through her own strength and determination, many obstacles in her way, she always regrouped and went forward with great pride and dignity.  That is what she has given me, strength, one goes on, pick up your pieces and get on with it, no one will do it for you.  At least that is her mind-set, and I’m guessing she hasn’t ever thought about that, she just forged on!

Our life takes us on many journeys, life happens, we control what we can and we learn to accept and live with what we can’t, and we never stop learning.  Life is a wonderful journey, I have lived in places I’ve not considered, visited places (even a reluctant traveler does travel) I would have only read about.  I’ve met people I’d never have had the privilege of knowing or loving, if life wasn’t so unpredictable.  Even with its unwanted surprises, and unexpected joys, life most days just goes along, a mixture of whatever we make it, and well worth living.  Who knows what’s around the corner?

From My Back Door to Yours, the Beauty of Texas Wildflowers

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lupinus texensis, nature, outdoors, plants

The last few weeks have been  a mixture of one unhappy event after another, today I’m putting all the serious thoughts aside, and enjoying the sunnier side of life.  At times taking a breath, stepping back and letting life happen is the right approach.  I intend to discuss all my thoughts of the last weeks but today, I’m heading to the wildflowers in my ‘back 40‘.

My ‘back 40’ is definitely not 40 acres by any stretch of imagination, we have 3 and a half acres and our house and formal (make that somewhat planned) gardens take up the rest.  We do have a large field behind our house.  It could use more tending and if I was a younger woman, oh the delights I could create.  One must have either wealth, youth or be realistic. Making do with what I have and my energy level seems to suit me.

We did take the steps of having the ‘back 40’ seeded when we moved here, not knowing what we really should have done and hiring a man flying by the seat of his pants to do the work, we reaped the not so beautiful results of our mistake.  We were growing every weed seed known to Texas, churned up and brought to fruition;  that was not the plan.  When you tell people your plan and you are a landscape gardener, well, some ‘taking it back’ on my part did take place.  A little humility is not a bad thing, but it’s still not fun!

Texas (Lupinus texensis). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The wild flowers in Texas start if it  is a good season with the outstanding burst of bluebonnets, I had never seen anything like them, they are spectacular and Mother Nature is in control, let me repeat that, Mother Nature (or just nature if you prefer) is controlling this show. Other wild flowers follow, not blue and soft in color but bright and joyous. I haven’t counted the several varieties in our field this year, I’m so grateful that the seeds we did sow years ago have found their way to bloom and give us the best  show to date.  We can’t count on this show for next year, it might bloom but may just as well not.  Depends on ‘Mother’ and it also depends on weed seeds, biannual plants and a wing and a prayer 🙂 So I don’t sound like I’m the only one able to pull off such a riot of color, the roads and ditches of our part of Texas look like a painters palate of color!

Yesterday started as a day of stress in a few areas, my solution is to head to the field, bring the camera, dress for the occasion.  Living in Texas you know that walking in fields with shoulder deep flowering plants you don’t wear your cutest shoes and shorts.  It’s boots, it’s bib overalls, long sleeves and a stick wouldn’t hurt.  Although I arm myself with my camera and I walk carefully.  I’m not afraid of what I might find, I’m hoping I do find something!  Our land isn’t flat so I’m up and down and avoid pot holes (no need to have Hal hopefully searching for me hours later while I languish at the bottom of a sink hole)!  He’s accustomed to me wandering off,  it might take some time for him to realize I was missing:-)  I think a neighbor or two may have seen me poking around back in the field, camera in hand.  I enjoy having just enough land for me to ‘wander’; if I sat down (heaven forbid) I wouldn’t be seen by anyone.  Just think what may go on in that field when we are not looking!  All manner of animal activity, that pleases me.

There are deer paths that I try to follow, even a bedding down place or two.   Not sure why that should make me feel pleasure other than a critter had a nice soft place to sleep and was relatively safe for the night.

Many of the plants grow tall,  over my head!  I’m only 5’4″ so that’s not gigantic but it’s a pretty nice size for a plant.  To photograph these lovelies I need to duck down, hide myself, not from critters but from the unrelenting winds.  If I used better camera equipment like I did years ago I’d perhaps have less problem with the wind, maybe better photos; but my time for fiddling with equipment has passed so I use a simple Panasonic Lumix HD and it serves my needs very well.

I hope that a peek into the wildflowers that have given us pleasure this year also give you a glimpse at how beautiful Central Texas (Cedar Creek) is in the spring, Isn’t it pleasing with all nature can do, good and bad,  it does also entertain us with such beauty?  It pleases me, especially in stressful times.