I feel like I have graduated. I just wrote the last check, licked the last envelope, finished the last meeting, and packed up all my mom’s papers. I will not look at theses things again, at least not for a long while. My mom died just about one year ago, on Christmas Day, 2010. I have finally finished settling her estate. It was a lot of work, but a labor of love. My husband toiled alongside of me for much of it, whether it was meeting with the lawyer, cleaning her house or tending her yard. We finished our last day at Mom’s home by burying a time capsule, and taking a nostalgic walk though her woods, now overgrown and almost unrecognizable from the woods I played in as a girl.
Today I’d like to share again the tribute I wrote to my mom which my husband read for me at her funeral, and also appeared on my blog on December 30, 2010. I know many of you have already read it, but today I post it again not for us, but for her.♥
My 85-year-old mother died this week. She had a long life, most of it healthy despite a robust smoking habit, some of it good, some not, but overall a life
that was varied and interesting. She was born of immigrant parents and grew up in a working class neighborhood of mostly Polish, Slovenian and others of eastern European descent. Her father worked in a factory, her mother stayed home raising kids, making chicken soup with homemade noodles, and poticca (poppy-seed bread) on special occasions, hanging her laundry on the line to dry while chatting over the fence to neighbors, and shopping at a neighborhood market, where you handed your list to the clerk behind the counter and they filled your order for you. My mother said they were “lucky” during the depression, because her father had a part-time job as a night watchman in a factory, while many other dads had nothing. Her growing up years are portrayed in pictures of her with her friends, sledding down a neighborhood hill, standing sweetly next to boyfriends, almost all dressed in army uniforms, and arm in arm with girlfriends, walking down the streets of Chicago or posing with the stone lions in front of the Art Institute. She quit high school in 11th grade to help support her family and worked in a factory making Karo syrup. Maybe that’s why her hearing became so bad in later years, as there was no OSHA to protect workers then. Later, as an adult, she proudly completed her GED, not because she had to, but because she felt incomplete without that diploma, even though she grew up in a time when many people, especially women, did not complete school past the eight grade.
She left her family in Chicago to move with her new husband to a farm in Michigan. Although she grew up a city girl, she traded it all for love, to pick pickles, gather eggs, and sell tomato seedlings from our little greenhouse. She raised three children without the benefit of disposable diapers, ready-made formula or an automatic clothes washer. She canned jam, hung clothes outside to dry and spent an entire day each week ironing. Her only phone was a black desk model on a party line. Her TV received two channels. She styled her hair with pin curls and gave her daughters hideous home perms.
She was the only mom who taught her daughters how to play hopscotch AND poker. She carried cigarettes in her purse next to pictures of her grandchildren. She could curse like a sailor and sweet-talk the priest, all on the very same day. One of her fondest memories was the day her grandchildren took her to…the casino.
People describe her as sometimes funny, sometimes fun, but always feisty. She was not afraid to speak her mind. I always heard about it if she didn’t like my clothes or hair or what I was doing, and not just as a teenager, but as an adult too. Her motto was “don’t go to any trouble,” yet she made sure you went to all kinds of trouble when she wanted you to. She was too impatient to ever wait in a line, but patient enough to comfort us through our childhood illnesses and boyfriend dramas. She deferred decision-making to her husband, but later as a widow, gained confidence to hire a roofer and plumber, get her car serviced and learn how to drive through the car wash.
She was determined to stay in her own home until she died and made sure we all felt miserable and abused when we “made her” move to our local hospice. But in the short time she was there, she was blessed and touched and basked under the loving care of the folks there, who were able to see past her sometime cantankerous exterior to the needs of a dying woman.
As we all whispered our goodbyes to her this Christmas day night, I think my youngest son said it best. He leaned into her ear and said “You had a good run Grandma, you had a good run.”
© Huffygirl 2011
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I hadn’t read the tribute to your mum until today, and it was beautiful. Your mum was quite a feisty woman with a mind of her own – I wish I’d known her! She would have been proud of your words about her life.
So now, a year later, all the loose ends of her life are tied up and complete, ready to be laid to rest like her. She would be proud of you.
Thanks Barb. It has been healing to have everything done and wrapped up now.
Thinking of you; this is a lovely tribute. Happy Holidays.
Thanks Lisa.
What a beautiful, beautiful homage to your mom.
So nice of you to say so Renee.
Oh Donna–I’m so sorry.. again. Christmas will always be such a bittersweet time. Your mom would have been so proud of you–and I only know you on the web. I will include you on the list of those I think about on Christmas Day.
Best,
Suzanne
What a nice thing to say – thank you Suzzane. I know this Christmas will be hard for you too with Marley gone – I’m sending good thoughts your way.
Way to make me start the day crying. This is a great tribute. Very well done.
Thanks Chris. Your words mean a lot. Sorry I made you cry though.
Your mother sounds like a wonderful person, not pale and comfortless, but full of enthusiasm and involved in life. How lucky you are to have had her as your mother…but then, I can’t help but think how lucky she was to have had you as a daughter. Thanks for sharing your beautiful mother (inside and out) with us.
Sanda, your kind words are just heartwarming. Thanks. I wonder what Mom would think if she knew we were talking about her like this? 🙂
She might blush, then quickly say something like, “Well, time’s a’wasting. I have to get those cookies in the oven.” She doesn’t sound like someone who tooted her own horn.
Well she wasn’t really the cookie baking type, and definitely did not toot her own horn. She probably would be appalled that we’re discussing her in fact.
Lovely post Donna. Our mother passed away April 2010 from Alzheimer’s, and left me and my brother with financial issues to deal with. We look forward to the day we can clear them up and close the door to this chapter of our lives…with God’s help it will all turn out right.
I’m sorry Ann, how unfortunate. I hope you get to settle things soon.
It will all get resolved in God’s time. I know how it is when putting a parent in a home of any kind. With mother having Alzheimer’s we were guided how best to get her there, what to say and do. But when she found out she was not going home, it was not a good time at all. I got the director and nurse and they got her in conversation so we could slip out. They told us not to worry that this was normal for people with that illness.
It is sad to take anyway away from their home and they can never go back. Heartbreaking!
Even though we were not close to mother we know she was not a bad person and had a tough life. We remember the good parts 🙂
Lovely heart felt tribute!
Thanks Jeanne.
A beautiful tribute. May you feel the love of her connection in your memories of her ever-so-good run. Peace.
Thanks for your kind thoughts Winsome.
A very moving, well-written tribute. Thank you for posting it again. May your beautiful, loving Mother live forever in your heart!
PS I so wish someone would teach me how to play poker… I’m terrible at bluffing.
Thanks Theresa. The bluffing is the hardest part. I haven’t played poker in years and have forgotten a lot of it – wish I had someone to play with again.
Thanks for the memories.
You are welcome as always Hubby.
Very well-written. I felt your emotions in the words you wrote.
Thanks Alex. I did write this while feeling the emotions at the time.
Huffy, It was even better the second time I read it. I’m glad you’ve tied up all the loose ends. It’s difficult when someone passes away at holiday time. But what a gift to have such memories of a wonderful mom.
Thanks so much Margaret. I debated about posting it again, but it felt like closure this time. The year has come full cirlce, and now I can cherish the memories. Have a wonderful Christmas. I am waiting for grandchildren to visit tomorrow!
I apologize for getting here so late, but I was truly blessed by this post. What a wonderful tribute to your mother. May your memories of her bring you comfort throughout your days.
Thanks for the encouraging words Cecelia. I too felt blessed in writing it, and I think others have felt as you do. It truly came to me in a moment of inspiration that I don’t think I could have recreated, had I let the moment pass. I’m so glad I did it.
I read this the first time and just came on it again. It brought tears to my eyes and shivers to my skin both times. You were blessed to have a mom who meant so much to you, and she was blessed to have you. You can’t ask for much more than that.
Thanks so much Techy. I wrote this in a moment of true inspiration – I was up half the night, but I’m glad I did it.