Mom's Firm Hand and Comforting Presence

Mom couldn’t quite control me as I was growing up. I got more spankings than anyone else did, except maybe, Bob. She said, “You were my hardest but you grew up pretty darned good anyway.” I think I made her proud of me—eventually. Worst threat of punishment other than the traditional, “Wait until your father gets home.” was, “I’ll send you somewhere where they’ll make you mind.” Banishment! The most terrifying prospect. I always behaved awhile after that one. The most comforting childhood moments with Mom was calling her to my sickbed just so she’d be close. I have fond memories of her combing my hair with water to get me ready for school when I was little. My saddest moment with Mom was when she cried when I left for California. I wanted to say something to comfort her but I couldn’t think of what. I felt so guilty about going so far away from her. This is what Mom said about my not getting married: “Don’t wait until you’re an old man.” What I said, “Don’t worry, I’ll give you plenty of time to get a new dress.” Wasn’t that just so smartass? What Mom said when I asked her if I should tell my brother and sisters about my personal life: “Why would you bother? They don’t tell you about their private lives, do they?” I think she didn’t want to be forced to discuss anyone’s private life with them, ever. I sent Mom and Dad money every payday all my working life. Sometimes only twenty-five dollars, but always something. I knew they were proud of me and I did everything to make them more proud, which actually kept me very competitive and challenged in my work. I was far happier for them than for myself when I won some honor or got a promotion in advertising. Some measure of payback for all their hard work and sacrifice, I suppose. That process made my life very rich and interesting, so they definitely get all the credit. When I was sixteen or seventeen, I used to sit alone with Mom in the kitchen at night. The other kids would be watching TV and Dad would be out in his workshop. I remember she often had a snack—usually a small sandwich like ham or Spam or corned beef and her last cup of coffee with cream for the day. It was a quite time and I could hear her false teeth clicking. She would talk quietly to me about more serious things. Nothing really personal like feelings, of course, but different than conversations in front of the whole family. I felt very privileged and very special for the adult nature of these talks. I can remember her talking about Grampa and what he meant to her. She really missed him after he died. And how she worried about Diana, and how hard Dad had to work to keep it all going. But never ever a complaint of any kind—never, ever. I learned a lot about family problems when Mom and Dad had high-level- decision conversations in the kitchen when they didn’t know I was listening from the davenport in the living room. Daddy would make proposals and Mom would comment. Often he would agree with her assessment and follow her wishes. I feel he really listened to her and wanted her input on important issues. These were definitely problem-solving give-and-take conversations and not at all the same as Daddy’s unilateral pronouncements displayed in front of the whole family. As a kid, one of my most sustaining memories is of setting next to Daddy on the sofa listening to the radio serial shows and waiting for the supper call from Mom. She’d time it so we’d get to hear our last radio serial. The aroma of dinner would be really heavy, and then she’d say, “Okay, you guys. Come and get it before I throw it out.” She said exactly that same thing every single night. She never had to say it twice. We anticipated every meal she made because they were so delicious and we were hungry. We were never allowed to eat between meals because, “That’s what makes you fat,” Mom said. In this memory, I can hear Mom’s true and actual voice of those days. But sadly, today I can hear the timbre of Dad’s voice only as it was much later in life. Mostly in phone conversations, right after I had moved to California. His voice from younger days is no longer in my memory banks. Don’t know why that is except maybe because he’s been gone so much longer. I can, however, hear Dad whistling and singing songs in the car when we were little. I was always acutely aware of how hard Mom worked when I was a kid. You could see the wear on her face at the end of a long day especially whenever a serious problem was occurring at the same time. Her hair, being so fine, would most always be wilted by day’s end. As we got older, she worked even harder to keep up with our growing needs for clothes and counsel and unimaginably huge quantities of foods. Jesse McFarland, Dale’s brother, told me, “Your mom is a saint and the hardest working woman I ever met.” He also said he’d get married only if he could find a woman as good as our mom. This stuck with me. (We kids wished Jesse would marry Iris because we thought he was so handsome.) I was not as aware that Dad was working so very hard, too. I just took all his efforts for granted. Mom’s abiding neutrality in the affairs of her grown family members is something from which we can all learn a lot about integrity, if not loyalty. I never ever heard Mom tell a lie, and I never saw her give one iota less than equal love to each of us. I wish my own life had been as pure and generous. I will forever regret I never got the chance to tell her how much we owed her for those lessons.