My Mother My Hero Strong title for sure. Having just replied to a comment Cliff left I felt some memories flood my brain. My mother. As a child I worshipped the ground she walked on. She was my knight in shining white armor. She was a nurse. Remember the days when nurses wore their stiffly starched white uniforms? Their crisply pressed absolutely shocking white caps? The white tights, and white nurses shoes? That's how I think of my mother often.



My mother had a very traumatic childhood which left her scarred and broken most of her life. As a single mother of three, most of her adult years she struggled not only to survive financially but emotionally as well. She was on the run and in hiding from the man who was our father. The man who did not want to pay child support, who wanted to gain custody of us so that he might put us up for adoption. This is the man who committed her to an asylum before she had me, and was sickly proud of the fact, that I was conceived in such a place. I was witness to many breakdowns, many weeks when she would not leave her room. We went through alcoholic episodes and violent meltdowns together. She suffered through bipolar episodes and clinical depression her whole life. All this said is not an attempt to degrade her or diminish her in anyone's eyes but to form a foundation from which she rose.

Some of my happiest memories are with my mother. Gardening out in the yard. Sharing the Sunday morning paper. She loved learning. I read the comics. My mother had strong opinions about everything. She could hold her own in any intellectual conversation taking place and new what was going on just about anywhere in the world. She helped me appreciate the flowers blooming, the smell of honeysuckle and citrus blossoms. She helped me understand that books held the world in between their covers and anyone no matter how poor could escape to exciting places at the opening of a book.

My mother did not like children's books, so when my babies were little she read them National Geographic, she didn't think you could ever spoil a baby, so she carried mine on her hips to keep them from crying.

When I was little she sewed not so much because she liked to, but because it was the only way she could put us in clothes. I had some of the most beautiful Pollyanna dresses you could find back then. I remember when she made my sisters homecoming dress, there were yards and yards of white satin flowing under her little singer featherweight sewing machine. I still have it by the way. When my babies were born, she sewed them their total wardrobes. Their tiny sacked flannel sleepwear. Their blankies and dresses.


She could cook like nobody's business. On special occasions we were presented with extraordinary roast beef dinners with Yorkshire pudding. Mexican dishes, Desserts to curb anyone's diet and the many ways to create pasta and potatoes.

When I turned 18 and fled the confines of my youth, my mother took this as a time to branch out. She traveled to Egypt, Rome and Mexico. She rode camels and took up parasailing. All the while still dealing with her bipolar and depression episodes.



Though our travels together were very rocky, full of emotional outbursts on both sides, we still held a very tight and somewhat twisted bond and I knew her love for me was strong.

My mother was as the song goes, "The wind beneath my wings". She was always encouraging, always up front, honest and forthright with me. She wasn't always on my side, but she helped me to realize I wasn't always right either. She was a great defender of childhood, she was the fiercest mother lion if anyone crossed or threatened her family. She always marveled at my children, how smart and incredible they were. She never once compared one to the other. She encouraged their individuality and was proud of them no matter what they wore or how they did their hair. Each child a crowning achievement in their own right.

I know I could go on and on, and I probably will somewhere down the road, but I think for now that says enough.  ¶ 4/02/2005 09:50:00 AM