Thanks for your thought re: Mother's Day.
Some of you already know the last time I saw my mother was when she and Daddy placed my two little boys (then 6 & 7) and me (27) on a plane to join my husband in South Dakota.
We managed to get to Atlanta; a two-day shutdown blizzard in Chicago lifted so I could get through there, although we missed our connection out of St. Paul-Minneapolis. Waited all day in the airport there for a flight at 4 p.m. to Rapid City, landing on a snowy Christmas Eve.
The next year was idyllic, roaming the beautiful Rocky Mountains; eventful, with the birth of our daughter September 30th; and dramatic as two weeks later the Cuban Missile Crisis dominated our Strategic Air Command life.
Ha! That was just a prelude for orders to go to Fairbanks, Alaska, departing the day after Christmas to go through Canada and the Alaska Highway to our destination.
There of course was no way to get to Florida to visit and then to the top of the world, but my mother and I wrote often until January of 1964 when she was stricken with an aneurysm, resulting in her being paralyzed, blind and unable to speak.
She passed away on my second son's tenth birthday in July of 1965 when I was 31, and I'd never gotten to hear her voice again.
She never saw my daughter.
Fast Forward through Gypsy Woman's Life to 1972 when we were out of the service and back in Florida.
Moving so often and renting mostly, I never hung photographs on walls, hauling boxes of them around. Jennifer was then 10, and thus, I realized, hadn't seen pictures of my parents.
One day, going through a box, I showed her some.
The moment I held up my mother's picture, she exclaimed, "But Mom! That's the lady who came to me last night when I was crying about Striker!!"
We had had to find a home for our beloved dog (Collie-Cocker Spaniel mix acquired when she was one), when we left the service in 1969.
She related when she was going to sleep, she was thinking of him amd crying, and suddenly "The Lady" appeared at the foot of her bed and comforted her!
She was adamant that the lady in the picture was the one who had been there and comforted her.
I add that she never had been a fanciful child with imaginary playmates - was a grounded military brat in her early years who rolled with the punches.
Thus am I sure Mom prompted me to get out the pictures to have 'confirmation' of what happened - and am certain of her continued presence, joined a few years later by my Dad.
I can tell you, too, living in this small South Carolina town where my grandfather and grandmother (her parents) lived in the 1920's - he the minister of a church right off the Center Circle by the County Courthouse - I can often 'feel' the prayers they offered here for their children and grandchildren!!
We are surrounded by the love of those gone ahead - - - and in giving love and kindness to others, honor their memories, and love grows - - -
Giving thanks from a grateful heart,
LadyX
Please give your living mothers a hug for me...
Thanks for your thought re: Mother's Day.
Likewise, here.
Wow. What an awesome story about your daughter and your Mother. Thanks for sharing that.
Please give your living mothers a hug for me...
And please give a hug to all your Mom's from Colleen too...Bless them all, Mom's are the best :-)
You know I wish I could!!! Thanks for the ping! I always love hearing bits and pieces of your event filled life as a grand American and a Marine! God bless and keep you LadyX!!!
Please give your living mothers a hug for me...
The hugs will have to wait til this summer when we head over the river and through the woods to visit. In the meantime, I'll be one of those folks jammin up the phone lines.
Happy Mother's Day, Auntie M
Dear Mom,
Seems as if it were just the other morning we had coffee together in the kitchen, easing into the day, that last morning together. I, of course, had no idea it was the very last time.
That night you and Daddy placed the boys and me on the plane to go to South Dakota, to a new chapter in our lives; and oh my, has it been an adventure!
Our letters were frequent, and the next year, I had a baby daughter. When we went from there to Fairbanks two months later, you always seemed to know when it was 3 days before pay day and the fellows from the unit had consumed our edibles, not realizing military pay limitations.
You'd taught me, though, about the fishes and the loaves - and just in case delivery of those was slow, you'd tuck those precious $5 bills in letters "to spend on myself"..:))
Although you went Home while I was perched on top of the world, you always have been there for me with your personification of love in this life....had conveyed without so many words one could succeed if you had self-respect (based on the Ten Commandments) and a sense of humor.
It didn't matter if I fell short of the mark - you always had a smile and an encouraging word. Anne and Carolyn and I were so blessed to have had you to love and guide us.
I'm at the other end of life now, and older than you were when you left.
Feeling often your presence and the power of your prayers, and Daddy's, you live on in me and in my children. I cannot thank you enough for the foundation you laid - the guidance when I stumbled - and always the love you gave us.
There is no sadness in remembering you, not physically visible on this day of honoring mothers.
As I do every year, I cannot order flowers to send you, so I plant them all over the yard to remind me of God's Creations, of which you are one of the most beautiful.
Spent much of yesterday doing that, Mom, and laughing, knowing you will overlook the weeds and spotted leaves on the three rose bushes (!) - that you will focus on the flowers that thrive and blossom, and know they are for you.
You taught me the spots and thorns are all a necessary part of growth, and to just keep trying - that the Master Gardener is always there to consult.
Thank you for being there for me all my life, even though you became a flower in His Garden - - one of the loveliest, I know.
