Things My Parents Told Me

  
                                                 My dad, Joseph and my mom, Camilla

      During a thunderstorm you're scared witless, your parents tell you the angels are bowling in heaven.
I asked my mother once why I had little white marks on the top of my fingernails, her reply, "you get them when you tell a lie."
You ask your parents where you came from, their reply "we found you under a cabbage leaf in the garden."
You're about to get a spanking, your parent says, "This hurts me worse than it hurts you." oh really, why am I the one crying.
"Go to sleep so Santa can come." You eventually find out Santa ain't never coming and he is, in fact, your parents.
"Don't stare at the sun, you'll go blind." well it probably was a good idea not to stare at the sun.
"Don't go swimming after you eat, you'll get cramps and drown." this one may have some medical proof to back it up, I have yet to research it.
You're at the doctor about to get a shot, "This won't hurt a bit." It didn't hurt a bit, it hurt alot.
"This medicine tastes good." I wised up to that one and found out if I held out they would pay me some money to take it, 50 cents bought alot back then.
"The tooth fairy didn't make it last night, she'll be here tonight." The tooth fairy a.k.a. your mother fell asleep and didn't put the money under your pillow.
These are a few of the things my parents told me. It makes me laugh now.

Familiarity

     Experiencing the familiar can be a comforting thing. We know our surroundings and the people around us, there is great comfort in our creature habits.
    But it can have its downside too. It can cause us to take the people in our life for granted resulting in a failure to truly appreciate them.
    I feel this more sharply than I have ever felt it before. We don't fully understand until the person that we have taken for granted is no longer there anymore. There is a void empty space.
    Memories are a double edged sword, there is joy in remembering, but there is pain in knowing that no more memories will be created with that person.
    You really realize in your heart how much that person meant to you. You may have known it in a thought, but it's like it has hit home.
    If there is one thing I could impress on you it would be, do not take your loved ones for granted. It may sound silly or trite and make fine words for a Hallmark card, but truth is truth.
    No amount of someone telling you that your loved one is in a better place is going to make you feel better. I expect in time the heart adjusts to the loss, comes to accept the way things are. The moments of acute pain will dull. The lesson learned is to look at the ones you dearly love who are still right here and appreciate them. Appreciate means it gets more valuable with the passage of time. May we truly appreciate our loved ones and look at them with new eyes.

Friends

     I had to go to Rockland today and on my way home I began to think of my mom. The place she stayed at was in Rockland. I started feeling really sad, thinking about how I just couldn't stop and visit her anymore because she wasn't there. It's the same feeling I used to get after my father passed away. My father used to sit by the window in his wheelchair. I had to drive by my parent's house on my way to work and it hit me, my father was no longer sitting by that window. It sounds silly, but all I could think of was Tiny Tim in A Christmas Carol, the part when they show his little chair by the fireplace empty because he is no longer there. I always get choked up and cry when that part of the movie plays.
     As I was driving home I decided to stop and visit a friend of mine. We had a cup of tea, nice imported English tea. We sat and talked. I felt cheered up. Tonight I turned on my computer, went to youtube and found a friend of mine had made a new video. I watched it, it made me smile. It cheered me up.
     Ever curious to know things I googled friend, here are two meanings of friend:

1. a person attached to another by feelings of affection or personal regard.

2. a person who gives assistance; patron; supporter

     My conclusion is how fortunate I am to have friends, who by the very fact that I know them are a blessing to me.

     I want to finish this blog entry with a little poem. I did not write it, but I love it and it fits the topic.

 

Make new friends,
but keep the old.
One is silver,
the other is gold.

A circle is round,
it has no end.
That's how long,
I will be your friend.

A fire burns bright,
it warms the heart.
We've been friends,
from the very start.

You have one hand,
I have the other.
Put them together,
We have each other.

Silver is precious,
Gold is too.
I am precious,
and so are you.

You help me,
and I'll help you
and together
we will see it through.

Across the land
Across the sea
Friends forever
We will always be

 

 

The Union Fair-The Exhibition Hall

Hooked Rugs

                                              
                                                    Handmade stained glass mirror

                                                  
                                                             Quilts, Tablerunners, Etc.

                                     
                                                                Necktie Quilt

                                                 
                                          Paintings from the art gallery in the exhibition hall

                                                   
                                               Wood lathe to make wooden bowls, etc.

                                               
                                                           Handmade wooden bowl

                                            
                                                   Handmade stained glass lamp shade

                                           
                                                               Crocheted Doilies

                                                        
                                                            The Garden Produce

                                                
                                                            Homemade pie display

The Union Fair -The Hodge School

     When I was growing up, there was an abandoned one room schoolhouse right up the road from my house. I spent many a happy day there playing, writing on the chalkboard, sitting at the desks. The Hodge School on the fair grounds remind me of that schoolhouse.

the back wall

a reading paper on the wall

the desks from the front of the classroom

side view of the desks

the blackboard

the schoolhouse light

the woodstove, to keep the classroom warm in the winter

How Long

How long will it be
I move forward,
Slipping backwards
I cannot see
Tears flooding my eyes
Coming on strong
Please tell me
How long
Everywhere I look
There is a reminder
Another memory
How long will it be
Will these tears
Ever leave
How long
Will I grieve

Finding The Humor

Even in the midst of the pain there are the moments of humor.
For instance while correcting what the funeral home had written so that my mother's obituary could be sent out to the papers, I told my daughter we should write, she worked at Sylvania for several years until she told her supervisor to go to hell and they fired her. Which is exactly what happened. But even though it might be an interesting read the constraints of proper society stop us from making such a faux pas. It however is a revelation of who my mother was, a spitfire.
She also used the word friggin alot. She never really swore, it was, friggin or oh sugar when she was upset. I guess oh sugar would have been used for mildly to moderately upset and friggin was used for the more upset she was or to drive a point home. My son noticed in a video I did of her recently, she says to me (referring to my videotaping with the camera) "I don't think you should be frigging around with that." He calls that "classic Gram."
My mother was always concerned that she not get fat, so she would run outside around the school for exercise. At one point I remember her buying a machine. You stood on the machine, put a belt around your hips and turned it on, it was suppose to jiggle the fat away. I'm laughing just writing this. One of her nurses said my mother remarked to her one day, "You must like to cook." The nurse said, "As a matter of fact I do." My mother then said, "I can tell, you have a fat ass." Thank goodness the nurse didn't take offence at it. Mom truly did not usually talk to people that way, I guess the alzheimers and old age got the best of her. She had friends that were overweight so she was not a fatist (my word for those who discriminate against overweight people).
My mother was a true friend. One of her friends got cancer and when she got very ill and was in the process of dying my mother went to her house almost every day, tended her, sat next to her, wiped her brow and held her hand.
She loved carnations, they were her favorite flower. Her favorite movie was Gone With the Wind, I personally think it's because of Clark Gable. She loved Paul Newman, she thought he had the prettiest eyes she had ever seen.
She wasn't a complainer, she always took things in stride, and would bear up under the adversities life brought.
She was always fun to be with, after my Dad died, she and I would go to Moody's diner, get coffee, 1 piece of pie we cut in 2, saved us money and calories, and we would sit there and talk.
I took her to Virginia with me after my father passed away. On the way home we got to Massachusetts and it started snowing, you could tell it was going to be a pretty good snowstorm. She turned, looked at me and said,"I'll give you fifty cents if you get me home safe." I said, "is that all you're worth, fifty cents." She just laughed.
She's home safe now.

Great Grandmothers

                                     
                                       

     My great grandmother's name was Ella Conant Black. She was born in Maine in the late 1800's. While she was still a teenager her family decided to move to North Dakota. Ella moved with them, but she hated North Dakota so she would move back to Maine. When she came back to Maine she met and married my great grandfather, Thomas Black. They had four children, all girls, my grandmother, Sadie, was one of those girls.
     I don't remember my great grandmother, I was only 2 years old when she died. But my mother and grandmother told me stories about her. Here are a couple of those stories about her and me.
When I was born my mother and father was living with my grandmother and grandfather, also dwelling in the house was my great grandmother, Ella.
     From the day my mother brought me home from the hospital my great grandmother assumed the care of me. I doubt that she got up at night with me, but her days were spent holding me and feeding me. She loved me, but as I grew she also spoiled me. I was told that at Christmas, the first Christmas I could walk, I toddled over to the tree and tried to take a glass bulb off the tree. My great aunt, Lou, reached out to slap my hand. My great grandmother took her cane and hit Lou with it for slapping my hand. Being an old woman pays off, you get to hit people with canes and get away with it.
     I was also told I called my great grandmother Mama and called my grandmother and mother by their first names. When my great grandmother passed away there was nobody to save me from punishment when I was naughty. The first time I did something bad my mother came after me. I ran to my great grandmother's bedroom door, which was closed, started kicking it and said, "Help Mama, Camilla and Sadie are after me. "Mind you, these stories are complete hearsay, but I have no reason to believe my mother or grandmother would make these things up.
     Having recently lost my mother, it will now be up to me to carry on the family tradition and tell Jack stories about him and his great grandmother, Camilla. Due to the modern age of technology, not only do I have pictures, but also videos of him and his great grandmother. Heaven help the little nipper.

Dread

                                                            My beautiful mother, Camilla
                                                        


So not looking forward to my mother's funeral today. Her death has hit me harder than my Grandparents and my Father's. It is one of the hardest things I have had to endure. I worked till 2:30 this morning making her tribute video. Inserting all of the pictures, adding 2 of her favorite songs and watching it to make sure it came out right reinforced in my heart that she is gone. Even though I know and believe her soul is alive in heaven, it is still a difficult weight to bear. But more than my pain and my tears is the desire to honer her. In some ways even though it is painful it is also therapeutic. It is an outlet for my grief.
Sometimes that grief is like an ocean wave washing over me, it crests and there are no words only the welling up of it  in my soul. My tears pour forth like a tributary flowing into a river, being carried by a current that is greater and stronger than myself. I give myself over to it until I feel empty.
I know in time things will get better, but for now I must grieve.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0oWn61irGQ

Mom

You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. Psalm 139:16
Today came as usual, the sun rose. For the past two days previous I had spent with my mother. Her condition much worsened and the end was drawing near. The hospice nurse told us my mother might rally, but we all knew in our hearts this was not to be.
Erica and I went to see Mom, she was unresponsive, staring at us, yet behind her eyes I could see, even though she was unable to speak. I didn't want to cry in front of her, not wishing to upset her. At one point Erica got tears in her eyes and my mother's eyes scrunched up, inside my chest tears were falling from my heart, I mustered up all the strength I could not to openly weep. I sang my mother a silly song that she had always loved and that we used to sing together. Erica sang to her, caressed her forehead and hugged her. The following day I went directly to my mother's side and stayed until 11:30 p.m. at which point my sister-in-law stayed with her until 2:00 a.m. and her son took over watch at 2. My sister went in again the next morning and then I came over. My sister and I spent the rest of the day by her side and into the evening with my brothers and all our children who came in  at different times. We gathered together as a family surrounding our mother who had always cared for us.  I stayed until 12:30 a.m this morning. So tired I had planned to go to work today then go straight to Mom's side in the early afternoon. It was not to be. I had my plan that when she died I would hold her hand, I wanted to do that even though I dreaded that moment when she would draw her last breath. It is hard to let go. Instead my Mom died early this morning, I was not there. Thankfully my nephew who took over my watch was with her. I felt crushed when I got the phone call, my first thought was that I was suppose to be there. However God's plans are not our plans nor His ways our ways. I accept that and my mother is now free.
I went to her room and hugged her now empty shell one last time. All that is left are the formalities for those of us who are left behind.
My mother's favorite flowers were carnations and this was her favorite song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVNj9Pl-i7I 
My mother has spread her wings and flown away.