During the week before Mother's Day we often read about frustrated
single mothers, weary working mothers, lonely elderly mothers, and weeping
mothers who grieve for dead children. The stories are traditional and proper.
Husbands and children also manage, for a few days in May, to pick up
their own dirty clothing, wipe the kitchen counters after washing the dishes,
take the clothes off the line before dark and actually fold them.
It is a week of flowers for penance, breakfast in bed, perhaps dinner
with candles. Most of us would probably also agree that mothers get too
little credit when offspring do well, and too much blame when they get
into trouble.
However, as with most public celebrations, I suspect that our private
thoughts bring into focus the memories of our mothers that are most important
to us as sons and daughters, maybe to all the world.
I thought about my mother April 29, when she would have been 76 years
old. Last fall our clan gathered to bury her in Marshall, Illinois, just
across the state line from my hometown of Terre Haute, Indiana.
My mother encouraged me to dream, she smiled often, she was always a
lady. She sent her grandchildren new mittens every Christmas. But on her
birthday the first year after she died I remembered when I made her very
angry.
Just turned 17 in the spring of 1960, looking forward to graduation,
I went fishing on a Sunday afternoon. The fish weren't biting, but a three
foot-long water snake, coiled on the bank, seemed appropriate for my zoology
class.
I had no bag or bottle, so I threw the snake into the trunk of the new
family car. I got home after dark, opened the trunk, and could not find
the snake. Discreetly, I told my father of my predicament. He shared my
concern.
Monday morning I drove Mom and two other women to work. Dad came to
school at noon, we took the lining out of the trunk, and found nothing.
There was a small crack in the rubber gasket at the bottom of the lid,
and we decided the snake must have squeezed through it.
I picked up the ladies at work, took them home , and after supper I
planned to take my sister to a friend's house. Margaret waited impatiently
in the car. I opened the driver's door and looked down.
On the strip of carpeted floor between the seat and the door, the snake
was coiled, bleeding from cuts apparently caused by springs under the seat,
but very much alive. This was not the zoology demonstration I had in mind.
"Margaret," I asked calmly, 'would you get out of the car
for just a minute?"
"What for?" she snapped, "I'm in a hurry."
The snake moved toward shelter. I grabbed it, then lifted my hand. My
sister screamed, jumped out of the car, and ran to the house.
My mother seldom ran and was never fast, but she got back to the scene
of the crime that day much more quickly than my sister left it.
Mom was not surprised that I brought a snake home. She was furious because
one of the women we took to work was in the ninth month of pregnancy, and
Mom was certain the snake, if seen, would have promoted delivery on the
spot.
When I was a teenager my mother was patient with my forgetfulness and
tolerant of my carelessness. Even though she never laughed about the snake
in the car, she was eventually able to forgive my stupidity.
My faults persisted after graduation. So did my mother. Over the years
my mother was patient, tolerant and forgiving. Those traits don't make
headlines, but I suspect many of us associate them with memories of our
mothers.
The world is different than it was when I brought a snake home from
a fishing trip. We seem to suffer more in our homes, while working, especially
in traffic, from a "get even" complex. Grudges have become the
banners we carry.
Maybe we should be more patient with forgetfulness, more tolerant of
carelessness, more forgiving of stupidity. Maybe this Mother's Day, even
after the flowers fade, we should act more like mothers.
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