Category Archives: Mom

December 5, 2013 · 0:00

The Truth May Be Out There … But it ain’t pretty

Well, it’s the moment of, ummm, truth.  Truth to tell, I don’t know exactly how many puns I can lie down in this here post before I get to the actual admission of guild.  Or guilt.

First of all, this five truths and a lie is a really fun thing to do.  Thank you Sips of Jen and Tonic!

Because, well, we all know so much about each other.  We have shared opinions, histories, illnesses, family – just about everything.  A quiz is in order.  Have you been reading my posts?  Really?  We will soon find out how well you know me.

Now I must fess up.  Damn it.

I asked you to choose which of these six items is a lie.

  • I once lobbied for the Koch Brothers.
  • When I met him many years ago, Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, the first black Supreme Court Justice, told a story about how he was once mistaken for the elevator operator by tourists in the Supreme Court building, and how he pretended he was the elevator operator.
  • I developed my interest in politics when I took a college course on the Kennedys only because I knew the professor would give me an “A.”
  • I attended an anti-war protest and had a front row seat for Peter, Paul and Mary.
  • My mother contracted polio when she was pregnant with me.
  • I grew up in a house that the whole neighborhood thought was haunted.

People seemed to like my Thurgood Marshall story, but they believed it.  They believed that my house was haunted, too.  So which is it?  Which is the lie?

Have I put off the inevitable confession long enough?

*     *     *

I DID meet Justice Thurgood Marshall in 1978.  I was in a small group of people escorting Justice Marshall to the elevator at the law school where I worked, but I was.  And he did tell this story to a small group of people.

Justice Thurgood MarshallPhoto Credit here

“Not long after I was confirmed,” he said, “I was in a special elevator at the Supreme Court reserved for ‘Justices Only.’  I was thinking to myself, “WOW! — I get to ride a special elevator!” when the door opened and an elderly couple stepped in.’

“’Basement, please,’ they said to me.  They seemed to think I was the elevator operator.”

Justice Marshall looked straight at me, smiled and said:

“So I shuffled.  Said ‘Yes m’am’ and ‘what floor you say you goin’ to?’”  And he shuffled his feet and swung his head to demonstrate.

Everybody in that little group was white.  There were several nervous chuckles, including mine.  Only one person laughed at the story  – Justice Marshall.

*     *     *

I took a great course on  “The World of Work” my first semester in college.  The professor was terrific.  It was a humanities class – designed to introduce business majors (of which I was one, albeit briefly) to real stories of working people and the things like government, society, economics, that impact workers.  The professor and I seemed to be the only ones interested in the class, actually.  But the syllabus was full of wonderful books chosen to instilling a more rounded view of the world in folks who would be focusing mostly on numbers and not people.  The professor liked me and suggested that I take a course he was teaching the next semester  — on the Kennedys.  He thought I was clever, and I participated in his class.  He was enthusiastic about my writing.  But I had no real interest in the Kennedys.  I only took it because I knew that I would get an A.  (I did.  And I got one in the first semester class, too.)  And it did open my eyes to politics, politicians and government.  The next fall I moved to Washington, DC.  And actually, one of the books I read for that class, The Making of the President 1960 by Theodore White, helped me get promoted in my next job.  So my real deep, abiding interest in politics came about because I wanted an A.  True Story.

By Theodore White A BRILLIANT book Barnes & Noble Image

By Theodore White
A BRILLIANT book
Barnes & Noble Image

*     *     *

I misled you intentionally with my Peter, Paul and Mary story, although it is completely true.  I DID have a front row seat at the Lincoln Memorial to protest the start of the Iraq War.  Me and a pitifully small crowd of about 300 other folks.  I brought a folding chair and plopped it down, front and center.  PP&M were wonderful, but sadly, they did not stop the Iraq War.  Bombs started falling the next day.  That night in 2003, me, Peter, Paul and Mary and the assorted small crowd looked up as Marine 1 – the President’s helicopter, circled over us.  Oh, for a stinger … Another true story.

*     *     *

My mother DID in fact, contract polio when she was pregnant.  But I lied.  Because it happened not when she was pregnant with me.  She was in her first trimester with my eldest brother Bob (2nd of the 5 of us).  Bob is the family member I rarely speak of — the only staunch conservative in the bunch.  I blame the electric shock and drug therapy Mom received when she was carrying him.  Yup.  That’s the reason he is the way he is.   You can believe me, I AM a fake medical professional after all.

*     *     *

And hardly anybody doubted that I grew up in a house that the whole neighborhood thought was haunted.  OK, so you guys are smart.  I can handle that.  My childhood home was located next to the railroad tracks.  The previous owner had been the guy who threw the switch to change the train from one track to the other.  He died on the tracks.  His sister who lived with him inherited the house.  But she couldn’t maintain it, and it fell into disrepair.  It was a mess when my dad bought it, sight unseen, in 1963.  Everybody in the neighborhood really did think it was haunted.  Part of me will always believe that it WAS haunted.  We moved in on Halloween and my Halloween candy disappeared that very night.

*     *     *

To those of you who believe that I would never, ever, ever, under any circumstances lobby for the Koch Brothers, I love you all.  Each and every one of you.  Because I never would have done it knowingly.  Certainly not if I’d known what they would become.  Or even knowing what they probably were back then (assholes, I’m bettin’).

And I am sooooooo ashamed.

The Catholic girl in me comes out at last.

The Catholic girl in me comes out at last.

Photo Credit

Bless me friends, for I have sinned.  It has been at least 25 years since my last project for David and Charles, but I did work for a law firm as a (very very low level) lobbyist.  And the Koch Brothers were, gulp, one of our clients.

Our energy clients were a bunch of small to medium companies – oil, gas, synthetic, alternative.  At the time I felt pretty proud that we didn’t represent any of the big guys.  Little guys (a category to which Koch Industries then belonged) were OK.  Right?  You there, Right?

Now some of you may have an inflated view of exactly what a lobbyist does.  The top ones – the ones who make the big bucks – pick up the phone and schmooze with big wigs.  They play tennis and golf with them.  Have lunch. Liquid lunches.

Me? I went to hearings and wrote memos.  ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ.  I ate Milky Way bars in the hall waiting for hearings to start instead of going out to fancy restaurants for four martinis.

So it is safe to say that I did not plant the seed that became the Koch Brothers.  I didn’t water it.  I might have thrown dirt at them had I known what they would become, but I didn’t even do that.  I wrote memos about what was happening in Congress.  Not what should happen to facilitate the taking over of America by the crazy people.

It was only in the last few years when I read or heard about David and Charles that I went “OH SHIT” .  Because I remembered that they were one of the old firm’s clients.

David and Charles were different back then.  I know that even though I can say that for certain as I never laid eyes on them.  They hadn’t yet become the evil twins.  They were not yet trying to take over the world.  They didn’t even know that they could buy votes in such volumes.  It took Justice Roberts’ court to do that.  (Did I mention that I used to hang out with Justice Roberts years ago ? … And when he was nominated for the Supreme Court nobody asked me a single question about him.  Oh, never mind.)

And you want to know the weirdest thing?  The Koch Brothers were very secretive.  Even back then, when they had much less to hide.  I may be assassinated just for admitting that I once worked for somebody who once worked for them.  You never know with guys with that much money and no conscience.  If I don’t post in the next couple of days, please send help.

In the meantime, please send soap.  “Out, damned spot! Out, I say!”

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Filed under Bloggin' Buddies, Books, Campaigning, Childhood Traumas, Criminal Activity, Disgustology, Family, History, Huh?, Humor, Hypocrisy, Law, Mom, Stupidity

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December 2, 2013 · 0:00

5 Truths and a Lie

Jen of Sips of Jen and Tonic did a fun post last month.  She listed 6 things about herself — five were true and one was a lie.  And she challenged others to do the same.  So here I am.  I’m ready.  I think.

Which one is the lie?

  • I once lobbied for the Koch brothers.
  • When I met him many years ago, Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, the first black Supreme Court Justice, told a story about how he was once mistaken for the elevator operator by tourists in the Supreme Court building, and how he pretended he was the elevator operator.
  • I developed my interest in politics when I took a college course on the Kennedys only because I knew the professor would give me an “A.”
  • I attended an anti-war protest and had a front row seat for Peter, Paul and Mary.
  • My mother contracted polio when she was pregnant with me.
  • I grew up in a house that the whole neighborhood thought was haunted.

My hairdresser knows, do you?

Put your guess into the comments.

94 Comments

Filed under Bloggin' Buddies, History, Huh?, Humor, Mom

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November 26, 2013 · 0:00

Talking Turkey with Mom

It seems like just the other day that I was talking about folks to whom strange things just happen.  Maybe that’s because it was just the other day that I told this story.

I have a secret, though.  I’m not the only person in my family with this, ummm, gift for attracting the strange and humorous.  Dad used to say that if there was a weirdo within 5 miles of him, that weirdo would find Dad and have a nice long chat.  But if something weird was going to happen, well, it would happen to Mom.  Somehow I managed to inherit both weirdness magnets.  Sigh.

But this is Mom’s story.

Mom wasn’t the bird lover in our family.  Dad was.  So I should have known something weird had happened when Mom identified a bird I was looking at from a distance.  Mom and I were driving not far from John’s and my house one day in about 1990, and I pulled over to look at the large birds circling above us.  Back then large predatory birds soaring were still an unusual sight — I always assumed they were eagles.  I mean, what else could it be?  I kept trying to get a good look.

“They’re turkey vultures,” she said with complete certainty.  “We see them all the time at home in Florida.”

You lookin' for me? (Google image, natch)

They weren’t eagles?
(Google image, natch)

“Turkey vultures?” I said, not believing her for a minute.  I’d never even heard of such a creature.  Mom pursed her lips and looked back at me, slightly annoyed that I was questioning her (never seen before) bird identification skills.

I should have been suspicious.  I should have know there was a story behind Mom’s sudden large bird expertise.

“They’re really big.  And up close, they really do look just like turkeys.”

“When did you ever get ‘up close’ to a turkey vulture, Mom?”

She tried to avoid the question.

“Mom….” It was never too hard to get Mom to tell her stories.  Something else we have in common.  “Fess up…”

“It wasn’t my fault.  That refrigerator at home is just too small.”

“Huh?”

“Well, it happened last Thanksgiving, but I didn’t want to tell you,” she laughed.  “I knew I’d never hear the end of it.”

“Mom …”

“Dad and I went to the grocery store on Saturday, as usual, the weekend before Thanksgiving,” she continued.  “And we bought a frozen turkey for Thanksgiving Dinner.”

“OK.”  I wasn’t catching on.

“Well, it was a frozen turkey.  Frozen solid.  You know it takes days to thaw those things.  You might as well try to melt an iceberg.  I put it into the roasting pan and placed it on the counter to thaw.  But I kept having to move it around that tiny kitchen to do anything else.  Then, on Sunday night when I was making dinner, I needed my counter.  So I put the still rock hard turkey into the carport.”

“Mom, doesn’t your carport get pretty warm?  It is in Florida, after all.”

“Well, that wasn’t really the problem,” she said, laughing.  “Not exactly, anyhow.  Or not at first.  The problem was that I forgot I’d left the turkey there.  I woke up Thursday morning, ready to get started on Thanksgiving Dinner and couldn’t find my turkey!  I thought I was going nuts.  I knew we had bought one.  ‘Where’d you put my turkey?’ I asked your father.  ‘I didn’t do anything with it.  Did it get up and walk away?’ he asked.  And then I remembered – ‘Oh Lord, it’s in the carport.  I hope it’s still OK to eat.’”

“I went out the door to find the carport  filled with turkey vultures.  And you know, they really do look just like turkeys.  They have those red heads and bulging eyes.  They had torn the packaging apart and were eating our Thanksgiving turkey!  I sent your father out to shoo them all away.  And then he had to go to Publix to get something for our feast.”

I roared.  So did she, remembering.

“I told him to get a piece of beef to roast.  I’d had enough birds for a while.”

Mom was absolutely right.  Turkey vultures look a whole lot like turkey turkeys.  Especially after they’ve just had Thanksgiving dinner.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING to my fellow ‘Mericans!

To those who aren’t over indulging this week, can I send you a few pounds?

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Filed under Conspicuous consumption, Diet tips, Disgustology, History, Holidays, Huh?, Humor, Mom, Wild Beasts

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December 17, 2012 · 0:00

Home for Christmas

She told the story every year with a warm smile on her face.  Sometimes her eyes got a little bit misty.

“It was 1943, and the War was on, and your father was in the Navy, on a ship somewhere in the Pacific.  We never knew where he was.  Like all the other boys I knew, he was in danger every day.  We lived for the mail, we were terrified of unfamiliar visitors in uniform.  A telegram sent us into a panic.  And ‘I’ll be home for Christmas’ had just been recorded by Bing Crosby.  It was Number One on the Hit Parade.”

That’s how Mom started the story every time.

Of course I’ll Be Home For Christmas was Number One that year.  Everyone, or just about, was hoping that someone they loved would, in fact, be home for Christmas.  That all the boys would be home for good.  But all too many people were disappointed.  I doubt there were many dry eyes when that song came on the radio that year or for the next few.

Mom and Dad got engaged right around Pearl Harbor Day, but the War lengthened their courtship significantly because Dad enlisted shortly after the attack.  It was to be a long war, and a long engagement.  But Mom was in love with her handsome man.  If possible, I think that Dad was even more so.

Mom, Circa 1943

Mom, Circa 1943

 

My Dad was drop-dead gorgeous, and I have heard that in his single days, he was a bit of a ladies’ man.  Every girl in town, it seemed, had a crush on Dad.

Dad, Circa 1943

Dad, Circa 1943

 

In fact, my Aunt Sally once told me that she had been manning a booth at a church bizarre one Saturday in about 1995, when an elderly woman came up to talk to her.

“Are you Freddie E’s sister?” the woman asked Aunt Sal.

“Yes I am.  Do you know my brother?” Aunt Sal responded.

“I did,” she sighed.  “I haven’t seen him since we graduated from high school in 1935.  Sixty years ago.  He was,” she stopped to think of just the right word, “… He was dream-my.”

“He still is,” Sally quipped.

One day not long after after Mom had passed, Dad and I were looking at some pictures I hadn’t seen before.

“Dad,” I told him with wonder looking at a particularly good shot, “You should have gone to Hollywood.  You’d have been a star.”

“Nah,” Dad said.  “Mom would never have gone with me.  And once the war was over, well, I wasn’t going anywhere else without her.”

Dad circa 1935

Dad circa 1935

Dad never quite got over feeling lucky that he had Mom.  And he never stopped loving her.

But back to Mom’s story.

“It was Christmas morning, 1943, and I went over to visit Dad’s mom and dad.  Grammy E’d had symptoms of Parkinson’s Disease for seven or eight years at that point.  She could still move around (she was later, when I knew her, almost completely paralyzed), but she could barely talk.”

Mom continued.  “But your Dad’s mom was singing ‘I’ll Be Home For Christmas.’  Well, she was trying to sing it, any how. She kept repeating that one line, over and over again.  ‘I’ll Be Home For Christmas.’  I thought she was crazy.”

“You see,” Mom would say, “Your father had somehow managed to get Christmas leave – he was coming home!  He wanted to surprise me and wouldn’t let anyone tell me he was coming.  He was expected any minute, and there I was, trying to leave.  But I couldn’t stay.  That song made me cry; Freddie was so far away, and in so much danger.  I couldn’t bear hearing it.”

So Mom left after a while, she had other people and her own family to see.  Later Dad caught up with her and they spent most of Christmas together.  Both of them always smiled at the memory.  Dad was home for Christmas that year, just like in the song.  It was a magical year for them both.

Mom was always touched by Dad’s surprise and by his mother’s loving gesture in fighting back the paralysis that was taking over her body to try to get her son’s girl to stay.  To sing when she could barely speak.

“I’ve always wished I’d stayed.”

We lost Mom on Easter of 1997, and Dad really never got over her passing.

The song and Mom’s story took on an even more poignant meaning in 2000.  Because on Christmas of that year, Dad joined Mom again for the holiday.  He went “home” to Mom for Christmas again, joining her in the afterlife.

Even through the sadness of losing Dad on Christmas, I always have to smile when I hear that song.  Because I can just see the warmth in Mom’s eyes now as she welcomed Dad home.  This time, I’m sure she was waiting for him with open arms.

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Filed under Family, History, Humor, Mom, Music

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November 21, 2012 · 0:00

My Silver Lining

Thursday, November 22, is Thanksgiving in the U.S.  It is also the 30th anniversary of the surgery I had for what was then thought to be severe ulcerative colitis.  It was a difficult time for me, but one for which I will be thankful for on Thanksgiving and really every day.  Yes, I got my health back as a result of the surgery, but that wasn’t the best part.

The most important part, the silver lining, was that I got to know my Mom, and it started a close relationship that lasted for the rest of her life and that I will feel grateful for for the rest of mine.

Mom was the sweetest woman on the planet.  My friends adored her.  Our house was always open to hoards of kids.  We lived near the beach, and it was convenient for everybody to just hang at our house.  But it was more than that. For years dozens of teens used our house as their home away from home.  There was always room, always plenty to eat, always a welcome.  No one was ever turned away, and the answer to “can So-And-So stay the night” (or “the weekend” or in some cases “the summer”) was always “sure.”

But we weren’t close, Mom and I.  I was Daddy’s girl from the start.  Mom, well, I loved her.  I even liked her, mostly.  It’s just that there wasn’t a whole lot about Mom to make me respect her.  She was completely helpless, you see.  Hopelessly so.  I can’t stand that and never have been able to deal with dependent people.  And “helpless”?  That was Mom in a nutshell.

She didn’t drive.  She didn’t shop without Dad.  She didn’t go for a walk alone.  She didn’t try to take control of family problems and help figure out how to solve them.  She waited for my dad to get home to reprimand, make a decision, to blow her nose, or so it seemed.  She was utterly and totally dependent upon my Dad.  It was incredibly annoying to this girl growing up in the late sixties and seventies during one of the strongest pushes for equal rights for women.  My friends’ mothers were out protesting the Vietnam War.  Mine didn’t even vote.  They burned their bras; Mom ironed hers.  They voiced their opinions ever more loudly.  Mom looked to Dad to indicate which way was up.

After I left home and became more self-sufficient, my irritation at Mom’s inability to do anything without Dad’s help, grew.

So when Mom announced, just weeks before I was to have radical, difficult surgery, that she was going to come to help, well, I panicked.  She was going to help me?  Yeah right.  Her announcement sent me into apoplexy.  It was the worse possible news heaped on a whole ream of really shitty news.  Who the hell was going to help her?

I lived with my roommate, Keily, and my 120 lb. alcoholic German Shepherd, Goliath, in a tiny Washington, DC, townhouse, in a not terribly safe area.  I was sure that Mom would get mugged — she’d make an easy target.  I feared that she would let the dog out and they would both die.  I drove a battered and temperamental VW Bug with a stick shift that Mom didn’t know how to use.  And of course, I wasn’t going to be able to help her because I was going to be recovering from having my guts totally ripped open and reorganized.

I couldn’t believe she would do this to me.

At the same time I couldn’t hurt her feelings and tell her that I didn’t want her.  Nope.  I could never have done that.  Not if my life depended on it.  Which of course, it might.

But once she dropped that bomb, I stopped worrying about the surgery, about the recovery, about everything except how I would take care of my caretaker.  Thankfully, my brother Fred came to help too.  He could drive my car; he could help with Mom for the week he took off from work.  My roommate, Keily, was a star, too.  (That’s a whole different story.)  But Mom came for what was a very long recovery, 2-1/2 months, so felt like I’d be pretty much on my own in taking care of her.

It wasn’t long after she arrived before I realized that Mom without Dad was a different person.  Dad loved the caretaker role, and she was happy to let him play it.  Without Dad, Mom had opinions on stuff, could make decisions and could give savvy and sage advice.  I decided quickly that maybe she and I were related after all.

And as soon as we got to the hospital, I was incredibly glad she was there.  I was admitted and headed up to my room, sending Mom and Fred to get settled in their hotel.  It was about dinnertime, which didn’t matter to me; I’d been on a clear liquid diet for about a week.  And while I was starving, I knew I couldn’t eat.  I had my instructions from my doctor:

(1) Do not eat; (2) Continue taking your medicines just like you are now; (3) Show up to the hospital.  (Always pay attention to the details when your guts are on the line.)

Now Hopkins is one of the best hospitals in the country and it was also one of only two places in the country where the operation I was to have could be performed.  The surgery was brand, spankin’ new – just a smidge beyond experimental.  It was dangerous.  It was highly specialized.   My doctors were to take out my large intestine, rearrange what was left of my plumbing so that things worked normally, and close me up.  Two surgeries were involved – they had to give me a colostomy (ewwww – a bag) in between the two surgeries while my innards healed.  Only 100 of these surgeries had been done in the world.  I was my surgeon’s 7th.  I was scared shitless which is saying a whole lot for a girl with bowel trouble.

But when I got to the hospital, everything went wrong.  They tried to insist I eat; they tried to give me the wrong medicine; they forgot about me and left me hanging out in my room where I fell asleep for several hours before someone wondered who I was.  The grand finale came when two nurses wheeled in an EKG machine, hooked me up and turned it on – and the machine started smoking.   The nurses, trying valiantly not to laugh, had to quickly unplug it and get it out of there.

“MOM!!!!”

I called her at her hotel in a complete panic, hysterical.

“I am not going to have this surgery.  What kind of a hospital is this?  They can’t even get an EKG machine to work.  It was smoking Mom, SMOKING!!!!  I’m not.  I’m not. I’m not.”

How is it that Moms know just how to calm down the most hysterical daughter?  I was and she did.  And she didn’t need Dad one little bit.  Yup, she calmed me down, and then, I heard later, called the nurses’ desk and chewed them out royally.  I’m pretty sure that was the first time she’d ever chewed anyone out.  But she wasn’t going to let anybody or anything upset her daughter or get in the way of the surgery that her daughter desperately needed.  And whatever she said worked.  Nothing else got screwed up.  They paid attention to her daughter.

In fact, Helpless Mom became SuperMom.  She corralled doctors when they didn’t come in a timely manner, she sweet-talked most of the nurses and they seemed to come around more and more often as they laughed and joked with Mom.  She was on a first name basis with all the residents and interns, knew if they were married, where they were from.  They got a little bit of mothering whenever they came into the room, and she charmed the lot of them.

She was always full of laughter, encouragement and fun.  Except when her sixth sense told her that I was feeling sorry for myself; then she’d tell me to stop sniveling.  Sometimes I needed that.

Back at home, she was great too.  She found the grocery store and walked to and from, lugging bags of food.  She fed me and Keily, gave beer to the dog, helped me get upstairs and downstairs.  Helped me do many things that were totally disgusting.  She helped me be independent again.  We laughed our way through Christmas together and then my birthday in January.  We laughed for two months, barely coming up for air.  We talked a whole lot, too, about everything.  We became fast friends.

There is one incident though, that made me realize that I’d never really known her before.  Could this crazy woman really be my Mom?

We’d driven my VW to Baltimore for a pre-surgical checkup before the 2nd surgery, scheduled for the 9th of February.  It was late January, and there were several inches of snow on the ground.  On the way back home, the VW died in the center lane of a busy highway.  I managed to coast to the side of the road, where the bug sighed once and died.  Shit.  I was still not at my best, and the promise of a long snowy walk was not a pleasant one for either Mom or I.

But a blue Honda Civic two-door driven by a big burly guy pulled up along the roadside next to us.  He rolled down the window and asked if we needed a lift.  I was about to explain that my car had just died and would he please call a tow truck, when, well, Mom jumped into the back seat! I stood there with my mouth flapping. Because I could hear her voice from my childhood talking in the back of my head:

NEVER EVER UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES GET INTO A CAR WITH A STRANGE MAN.

THEY ARE ALL RAPISTS

But there she was, the woman who taught me never, ever, to get into a car with a rapist — she was in the back seat of a stranger/potential rapist’s car.  WTF?????  What the hell was she doing?

I didn’t know what else to do, so I got into the front seat.  And there on the floor was something else that shocked me:  A  teddy bear with a green t-shirt that said “I’m Going To Steal Your Love.”

“Wonderful,” I thought, “a rapist with a sense of humor.”

As it turned out, the guy wasn’t a rapist — really!  He took us to a reputable garage where they agreed to tow and fix my damn car.

But the adventure wasn’t over yet — we still needed to get home.  The hotel across from the garage had a shuttle bus that went to BWI Airport.  From there, we were told, there was another shuttle bus that could get us back to DC.  It sounded perfect.

Perfect except for the fact that we had hardly any money left  The shuttle to DC only took cash.  No credit cards.  No beads.  No chickens.  Cash.  Shit.

We didn’t have enough for the fare, and couldn’t have come up with any more money.  But that didn’t stop Mom.

She walked up to the shuttle driver and chatted her up.

“Do you think you can let us both on for $16.50?”

“Sorry M’am, the adult fare is $10.”

“What’s the child’s fee?  I mean, after all, she’s my little girl.”

The driver let us both on, shaking her head and smiling at Mom.  Feeling like she’d done a good deed (she had).

Mom was there for my second operation, and then she headed home with Dad who had come up for it.  When he arrived, Mom didn’t just let Dad do everything as she always had before.  She showed him around — showed him her turf.  She had realized that she really liked feeling in charge, and doing things on her own, for herself and for me.

For the rest of Mom’s life, she and I had a whole different relationship.  I had always loved her, always liked her.  But her care for me, and her resourcefulness and sense of duty and just plain fun let me develop a respect for her I’d never had.

I’ve always felt lucky in a way to have had these health problems.  Because they gave me my Mom.  I would never have known her, never have laughed with her so very much.  I wouldn’t have heard the stories of her life, told with love and humor, the way she did everything.

So on Thanksgiving, I will raise a special toast to Mom, my SuperMom.

Could you say “no” to this woman?

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