It seems that in recent years, I have used the week of Easter, known as Spring Break in our school system, to drive to wherever my mother is living and visit her. For the past two years, my mother has lived in or near Foley, Alabama. Last month, she moved back to Warner Robins, Georgia.
My sister, who lives in Georgia, and I (NC) were so excited about the move, trying to understand why she left in the first place, but mostly looking forward to having her closer to either of us. I won't go into the details that do not matter to anyone but my family, but I will say this... my mother seems happy, and that's all anyone could want for their mama.
My mother can find happiness in any moment of her life, no matter how tragic the times were, nor how desperate she might have been, nor the pain she might have experienced. She has told us only a few stories of her childhood, and many stories of what it was like to be the wife of an Air Force man. The rest we know from our own points of view.
We are learning (my sister and I) that our perspectives are very different from hers. We may never know what it was like to walk her path, to live during the times she lived, in the places she lived, raising the seven kids she and my dad raised. We can't possibly know what it was like to be newly wed in 1952, her young husband about to join the military, and soon after her first child was born, he was stationed in far away French Morroco.
We two girls were the first two children born to Toni and Joe Owens, and life must have been pretty good for us. My mom was living below or above her oldest sister during part of that time, whom she was very close to, and still is though they are thousands of miles apart. I can only imagine the great care mom gave to us, her baby girls, her little toddlers... well by the time my sister was a toddler, my brother Joe was born, followed by brother John, a couple years later in England Robert came forth, then Michael in New Hampshire, and lastly our baby sister, Vickie.
We moved about like a small colony of ants every couple of years. That's the life of an Air Force family.
Back to our visit last week... Mom is a generous hostess. While we were guests in her house, she cooked our meals. Mom would have made a great Bed and Breakfast caretaker. She'd be the one to cook and serve the meals, and keep the place clean. My mother sings when she is cooking and cleaning... nothing in particular, with or without the radio on. It's her signature mark... when Toni is singing, her world is good.
Actually, I've heard my mother singing even when her world was not good, like the week after the accident in Texas. For a few days, my parents were laying in two different hospitals. My dad was in the military hospital, mom in the civilian hospital in the city of El Paso. It took three days and some paperwork to get my mom transferred to the hospital on the mountain where my dad was. But finally, the military staff came and got her and took her to my dad so they could recover together. That sure made visiting easier on her family who had flown thousands of miles to be with them.
She was miserable until she could be with her husband. She had to know that he was alive, and he had to know that she was as well. He did not believe us until she was there in his room.
One morning I was approaching their hospital room (the military hospital). I heard singing as I passed the nurses station. I paused to listen to it, and marvelled that even after this tragedy, mom could still sing. Not that she had the ability to sing, but that she had the will and the heart. What was there possibly to sing about?
I walked up to their doorslowly, knowing they could not hear me. The TV was on. In one bed lay mom, missing much of her scalp, and in the other bed was my dad, his broken neck and head surrounded by the metal halo. Despite my sadness and exhaustion from the experience of staying by them until I could find a way to get them home, over a thousand miles away, the sound of my mother's child-like voice singing lightened me. I knew she would be well, that she would get through this. It was more than being on good drugs... my mother communicates to the world that she trusts God in all things when she sings.
"Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth... worship Him with gladness. Come before Him with songs of joy! Know that the Lord is God. It is He who made us, we are His. We are His people, the sheep in His pasture." (from Psalm 100)
Also, mom likes to embroider. Or knit, or crochet. She likes to keep her hands busy. In fact, my mom just likes to do things and make things. I seldom see her just sitting still. If she is still, she falls asleep. I think I get that from her. Although, I can sit through very long movies without a single yawn... I got that from my dad... he always loved movies. Big Screen, Drive-in movies, rental videos. He never had the pleasure of watching DVD movies, but he would have loved them. (BTW, Russ, my dad loved horror/scary movies, comedies, westerns, and military stories. Oh yeah, and Sci-Fi. Animal stories he would cry during. I think he would have been able to identify your movie quotes!)
So the reason I'm telling you all this is this:
I felt great joy* while watching my mother go through boxes of her things that were recently returned to her, things that had been packed up and sitting at my sister's home, or in her storage building. Things my mother had nearly forgotten about because she had just left them behind when she moved to Alabama over two years ago.
If my sister had not picked up those things and brought them to her home for safe-keeping, it is very likely they would all have been taken to the dump. There were clothes, some small furniture pieces, knick knacks, and lots and lots of photos and albums. Framed pictures, drawings I had done years ago... lots of pictures. Lots of things someone else would call junk. Things my mother treasured.
I know my sister experienced a great deal of turmoil over the experience of trying to help my mother get a new home, and how she wrestled with my mother's decision to move to Alabama. But last week or so, she returned the boxes of personal things to my mother in her new place of residence. My mother was very happy to get those boxes.
I just wanted to share this one thing with her, with everyone who reads this... this one piece of treasure that my mother found in all that 'junk'... was a card.
I watched my mother read it. It was from my dad who had passed away in 2002. I don't know when he gave it to her, but she had kept it...(I got that trait from my mother also. I've saved all the cards my loved ones give me).
He had written at the bottom of the card "You're the best thing that ever happened to me, honest!" and on the other side, "Your loving husband, Joe".
I'd say that was one of mom's treasures. And I say, thank you, Joy, for keeping those boxes. Yes, it was worth it. You had to deal with it, I didn't. You did all the dirty work, I didn't. You and your husband made her happiness possible. It doesn't matter for how long the happiness lasts, but that it is experienced. You made it happen for our mother this week.
*If you go back seven paragraphs, to the bold asterisk, you will find the pun. It will make more sense now that you know my sister's name.
