Late last night, while shivering without a working furnace, I put some thoughts down. Why I feel the need to share them I don't know. Maybe I think that if I just start that unpublished book or non-produced screenplay will show up in the future. Trust me, if I ever got it done it would be a bestseller, not because of anything I did being the conduit that got the story told, but because of the story and character that was my mother. I never met anybody else like her. Let me just say, we were close, very close for almost 9 months, and from then on I was pure aggravation for her.
Happy birthday, Mom!
.
My mom was... an enigma, a will-o'-the wisp, A flibbertigibbet!, A clown! Cut the clown part.(Mom if you are checking this, note that I said very clearly cut the clown) That does not describe her at all. Still, she was as much a conundrum as Maria ever thought about being. Trying to be one of her kids was an adventure. A-D-V-E-N-T-U-R-E, right here in River City, and that rhymes with P and that stands for...
Looking back I think I can say I knew 10 or 11 different mom(s). There was:
Prior to State Hospital Mom, Mom until Kansas Farmer, Kansas Farmer Mom, Capper’s Weekly Mom, Austin Mom, Post Cancer Mom, Dialysis Mom, Understandably Bitter Mom, Widow Mom, then of course the late Mom. Late mom segues into Saint Mom, which happens to most normal people when they die.
Casual sainthood occurs when we finally forgive those we love for all the perceived slights and peevish behavior that always made us so mad at them. True, there are folks who are truly unforgivable and they don’t get that benefit of a cleaned slate after death. I have a cousin, he and I are never hesitant to critique or criticize our fellow family members, we talk often and joke about the family habit of “beatification” of the dead. Complain and moan about them all the time when they are alive and as soon as the heart has stopped beating time to treat them like a saint and forget all the bad.
Thinking about Mom there is so much I’d like to say about her. Lots of stuff I’d like to talk to her about. I could talk about how she always favored my brother and sister over me or how she could be so pig headed with her strong opinions or how she and Dad fought just to pass the time of day. And what was the deal with her pills, there were so many of them...okay, she had no control over that and as much as helping her with her pills would frustrate me then, now I consume more than she ever did every single day. My years of training at the edge of her pill can prepared me for dealing with the handful I take each day. As I think about the aspects of Mom that frustrated me I am forced to admit, cliched as it might be, that those traits that bothered me the most, that drove me nuts, are behaviors I see in myself.
I got so much from my parents. Yes, there is both good and bad when I review my list of “gifts.” I remember the good the most, although I’ve never shied away from discussing the negative. It all goes into the whole of what folks mean to us.
my mother, Sammy, not Sammie or Samantha, but Sammy
I cannot recall that she was ever wrong about anything, in my opinion
Help is gift we offer no matter when, where, who, why, or what, in my opinion
Doctors and garbage-men should be paid the same, in my opinion
If it is a book, read it, in my opinion
Support the arts, experience them, in my opinion
Take walks with children, in my opinion
Be respectful, gracious, kind, say thank you, in my opinion
Read the paper, keep up with current affairs, express ideas, use reason, defend positions, in my opinion
Be only intolerant of intolerance, in my opinion
Take notes, wear powder and lipstick so you won't look like a ghost, in my opinion
Hope to not be disappointed, in my opinion
Be nicer to your siblings, in my opinion
If you wash feet, change socks, they won't smell so bad, in my opinion
Avoid electro shock if you want to remember French, in my opinion
Always say, in your opinion, in my opinion
In my opinion she remains an iconic character who deserves to have her story told, she was a scraper, a fighter, time traveler, a champion of lost causes and souls, she always asked the question others steered clear of, she was short tempered, used profanity artistically, believed in the truth, she was filled with indignant rage at times, a saint to have lived forty plus years with my father. When I saw her after I was an adult I could count on being told, "Rile, you are crazier than hell!"
She was forced to face the trials of a she-Job and kept going, she was that pink rabbit on television until finally that last weekend’s family gatherings in Graford zapped and drained the battery, she was tired, worn out, whipped and I'm thinking when she got in bed that night she prayed the prayer of the supplicant seeking relief,
Dear God, it has been a good life, I’ll give you that. I'm tired, very tired. I really don't want to take all those pills and fight the battles I do. You try dialysis for nearly a decade, and cancer, depression, living with that...s.o.b., god I miss him, Forgive me, but could I just get a break. Just one, I just want to go to sleep and rest. I mean really rest, I mean rest the rest of the just and head on to into the sunset and take on what's next in the fullness of time. If I've done my job, and I think I have, god only knows, I mean I hope you are aware that I've tried, those I leave behind can handle what they have to face and if they can't by god, they ought to. I just hope they aren't disappointed. So, let me rest. If that isn't workable, well okay. but think about it. I will keep doing what you want me to. Amen
My mother, she never gave up.
My only regret is that while she was living I never did anything right, in HER opinion.
I tried.
Her headstone stands at McAdams as the last memorial to her life
An unmovable stone she must share with my father, her husband, when she and everyone else knows she should have gotten her own
She deserved at least that
I think it is pretty decent as headstones go
a Doig quote, "here lies all of them that could die"
a sentiment I find comforting
one minor detail
her birth-date is off by one year
once again I failed her
I mean the mistake is etched in stone
It seems fitting that even at the very end, it is always something, a screw up, a hassle, a trial
She didn't complain, she accepted it and moved on
So far, at least, she hasn’t said anything to me about it
Her name was Sammy
she was the only mother that could love a son like me,
in my opinion
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