My parents met in the Brooklyn Public Library; my father was the head librarian and my mother was an assistant librarian. Both of them loved all things 'library', and they made sure we had a library card to loan books from an early age. We learned early on the value of books, newspapers, and magazines to provide important and enjoyable information, and we were avid readers as children. Reading was encouraged by our parents and our schools. Libraries were an important part of our childhood and teenage years. It helped that one of the most beautiful libraries I have ever seen, (if not the most beautiful)--The Warner Library in Tarrytown--was the library where we spent many a summer day looking for books to read.
My father went to his job as head librarian through the years, working for several different companies in Tarrytown and Manhattan. Our dinner table discussions were interesting; I learned a lot about the library world from listening to him, and absorbed his enthusiasm for his job. My father showed me how to use different reference books, so that I could apply to different companies for jobs after college. He knew all about the different reference books that existed. My mother kept a spotless house, not an easy task when we were children. There were places for our toys, and we were expected to keep them in those places, which made sense, because we grew up in an apartment and there wasn't much room to spread out. My mother was able to get three children out of bed, washed, dressed, fed breakfast, all by 8:15 am when we left for school. She had a sense of order and discipline, and she expected us to live according to both.
As I've gotten older, I've realized that my sense of order, my predilection for systematizing many of the things in my life--books I've read, films I've seen, Christmas card lists and lists in general, garden plans--stem from my upbringing. They are the direct result of parents who appreciated order and systems, likely due to their both being librarians. But of course genetics play a part in it too. I inherited the genes for organization and order from both my parents. I realized the other day that one of the reasons I enjoy the new role I have at work (biobank coordinator) is because it requires me to structure and organize information and procedures. I'm good at it and I enjoy it. It is a niche in which I feel comfortable. I channel my parents these days, and it's a nice reminder of how much they meant to me when I was growing up, of how important they were for the security and comfort we enjoyed. I have joined their circle, so to speak, the circle of people for whom dissemination of information, organization, and order, are desirable things.
Showing posts with label parents. Show all posts
Showing posts with label parents. Show all posts
Sunday, November 3, 2019
Sunday, October 29, 2017
The legacy of bullying and rudeness
I am often reminded of childhood’s mixed bag of blessings
and curses when I stumble upon a faded photo from that time or someone posts a
photo of when we were twelve years old on Facebook. It brings back some sad and strange memories. Some of my
memories of grammar school are of students who bullied other students, or of several
teachers who bullied students. The students who bullied other students were
often the popular girls who picked on the weakest girl (or boy) in the class. I cannot remember that the boys behaved similarly, except for one boy who could never say anything nice. I never understood their bullying behavior then, and
less so now, because on Facebook, all appears to be forgiven. The bullies and
the bullied are friends, and talk about grammar school in their posts as though
it was one of life’s all-time greatest experiences (it wasn’t, and neither was
high school). I am friends with them all too on Facebook, but sometimes I
question the wisdom of it. Perhaps some things should be left in the past,
because as far as I’m concerned, seeing photos from that time merely rips open
the wounds from that time. I escaped being the target of the bullies because
I was the smartest in the class and they did not know how to deal with me, so
they left me alone. Others were not so lucky, and were bullied for being dumb (the word at that time for kids who were not book-smart), often because the teachers also bullied the same children and set a poor example (e.g. making them go sit in a corner on a stool because they were not good students). Sometimes children were bullied for not being good-looking, because their families didn't have money, or because they had strict parents and were not allowed to attend the parties that the bullies could attend. It was a time in life when you
could not count on support from teachers to stand up to the bullies, because
some of the teachers were too busying bullying a few students of their own—for being 'dumb' as already mentioned, or too thin, for being sickly, for having to use the bathroom a lot, for being
high-strung or overly-sensitive. The list goes on. I know of parents who tried
to talk to the principal of the school about the bullying and who were rebuffed
for the most part. I did not take part in the bullying of others; in fact in
several instances I fought against it but there was little an eleven year old
girl could do against mean teachers or a gang of mean girls. Ignore them, don’t
get involved with them, and don’t hang out with them. All those things worked
and got me through grammar school. I guess I told my parents about one unfortunate girl
who got bullied, and I know they found it appalling, even more so if it went on
while the teachers looked the other way. But it was a different era and there
was less focus on such things; the weak and the bullied were kicked aside and
had to fend for themselves. Most of them did and have had adult lives that are
successful and probably happy, likewise for the bullies--many of them have grown up to be decent people. But if I become sad just remembering the
bullying of others that went on, what must the bullied persons feel when they
remember back to that time? And how do the bullies remember their childhood?
Bullies are like sharks; they smell blood and come running.
They smell weakness and exploit that for their own gains, which looking back,
were short-lived. They were popular for a while at the expense of others, and
then they weren’t anymore. I know one woman who has apologized for her bullying
behavior when she was a child. She has expressed remorse knowing she hurt
others with her behavior. She comes from a wealthy background with
everything she could desire growing up. So it’s hard to understand why bullies
bully. Is it because they can, and get away with it? Adults tend to excuse the
behavior of children with statements like ‘They’re only children’ or ‘He didn’t
mean it’ or ‘She’s overly-sensitive to everything’ or ‘He’ll grow out of it’ or
‘Let them solve it themselves’. It doesn’t matter sometimes if children have
nearly killed another child; they have to find excuses for their children and
for why their children aren’t bad children. Maybe bullies had bullies for
parents. It could be one logical explanation. I don’t subscribe to the view
that people (including children) are inherently good; children are only as good as their parents,
meaning that the role of parents is so important that perhaps not all people
should have children if they know they cannot take on that role. You must be a good role model for your children; if you want them to be good people, you must be a
good person yourself. Our Catholic faith teaches about the concept of original
sin, i.e., that we are born with original sin (a propensity to sin given our
free will?) but that our baptism introduces us to the saving grace of Christ
who came to save sinners and frees us from original sin. In other words, we are
given spiritual help from Christ via our church, our parents and our godparents
who renounce the devil for us because we cannot as babies. We don’t know what
is good or bad when we are babies and toddlers—that is the job of our parents
and teachers to teach us. I feel sure that children who exhibit bullying
behavior who are rarely reprimanded by their parents grow up to be bullies. Or
that those who were bullied, if not given the help they needed from the adults
in their lives, can also grow up to be bullies. Regardless, the fault lies with
the adults who close their eyes to the bullying and bad behavior they see in
their children and other children—the adults who never want to get involved.
When I got to high school, it could be the opposite, that a
few students bullied one or two teachers. If I hadn’t seen the fallout from
those occurrences I would never have believed it could happen. As it was, two
teachers, a man and a woman--both in their early thirties, were helpless against a gang of five or six teenage
women who targeted them for destruction. Both lost their jobs because they had
no control over their classrooms; their students lost respect for them even
though many sympathized with their plight. Perhaps it is no wonder that the
teachers who survived were the ones who took no shit from anyone and stated
that right up front. Being a teacher is not a popularity test; it is not an
exercise in finding out how popular you are among your students. You’re there for
a purpose, and that is to teach them, not be their friend. If friendships with
students develop, that’s great, but you can never forget your position and your
role, and the reason you are there.
Which brings me to rudeness; rudeness often accompanies
bullying. They go hand in hand. Bullies are rude to those they bully but also
to society generally. The word ‘rude’ has so many definitions; some are as
follows--offensively impolite or
bad-mannered, discourteous, impertinent, insolent, impudent, cheeky, audacious,
presumptuous, uncivil, disrespectful,
unmannerly, ill-bred, churlish, crass, curt, brusque, blunt, ungracious,
graceless, brash, unpleasant, disagreeable, offhand, short, sharp. Notice
the three words I have highlighted; they merely emphasize my point—that parents
must step up to the plate and do their job as parents—they must raise
respectful, mannerly and well-bred children for the good of society. That is their job. If they do not
want that job, then they should not have children.
I bring this up in today’s post because of the memories that
were triggered by a photo from childhood, but also because the USA has a
president who is both rude and a bully. His father didn’t sound like an empathetic parental figure. But his mother sounded like a decent person. So how
did Trump get to be the way he is? Because along the way people permitted his
behavior or even admired it, because people dismissed his behavior in a joking way (‘He
doesn’t mean it’ (sound familiar?), because he was wealthy and many people exempt the wealthy from the rules, or because he made others wealthy. If you do not stand up against this kind of
behavior, you are complicit in creating a society that worships these types of
people at the expense of respectful, mannerly and well-bred individuals. You
cannot bemoan that situation ten years down the line when you yourself were complicit
in creating it by not standing up for what is decent and ethically right at
present.
Wednesday, October 12, 2016
Moments and connections
This past weekend was a ‘moments’ weekend, where something I read or heard triggered memories of my parents and my childhood. At mass this morning, something the priest said must have unconsciously triggered a memory of my mother, and all of a sudden it was almost as though I could feel her standing in the aisle beside me. Going to mass together was one of the things we used to like to do when I visited her in Tarrytown during the 1990s. I remember sitting in the church with her, singing the hymns that she liked, and hearing her sniffle when something in the hymn touched a nerve that made her tear up. Now, fifteen years after her death, I cannot sing those hymns without the same thing happening to me because they remind me of her. Perhaps those hymns reminded her of her own mother. I thought of how tightly I am connected to my mother, that the bond between mother and child is so strong, stronger than death. That’s a comforting thought, not a sad one.
Later on, when I was standing in the kitchen cutting up a pumpkin to prepare puree, I remembered how much my mother loved the autumn, how much energy it gave her for new projects. I was feeling that way the entire weekend. Whenever I have worked in the garden, I have felt her presence as well, and that is no surprise since she loved planting her own garden in the spring. A small flower garden, but one she was very proud of and that looked so lovely each year. She planted morning glories at the base of the lampposts so that they would have a post to climb as they grew. She planted a trellis on the side of the apartment building we lived in, and grew red roses there. And she ordered her tulip bulbs from Holland each year from a catalog company I don’t remember the name of. Whenever I hear the birds in my own garden, I am reminded of my mother’s love of birds. She would watch them from our kitchen window as they gathered in the dogwood tree outside the window, and during the winter she made sure they had enough food.
I think of my father too, when I am sitting at the dinner table with my husband and we are discussing different world situations. It reminds me of all the times I sat with my father after dinner and discussed the state of the world with him. That was when I was growing up in the 1970s. In the 1980s, when I was working in Manhattan, I would sometimes meet him for lunch since he worked there as well, and we would wander over to St. Francis of Assisi church on West 31st Street. I seem to remember that the church had a bookstore/gift shop then, and we would purchase a book or two and look forward to discussing them after we had read them. I checked the church’s website but could not find any mention of the bookstore, so perhaps it no longer exists or perhaps my memory is faulty. My father and I bonded over books and faith, and they led to spiritual and intellectual discussions that buoyed me through my teenage years. He was my link to the outside world and to the work world. He died over thirty years ago, a lifetime in so many respects. Yet that connection too remains strong.
Books are the portals that allow me to connect to my parents. I remember them individually and together. I was closest to my father when I was a teenager, and when he died, I grew very close to my mother. As a child, I remember them as a couple, sitting together in the evening reading their individual books. Before my father’s health diminished him, he would sometimes tease my mother or chase her around the dining room table. That vision sticks in my mind—that they had their happy moments in the middle of their trying times, mostly due to my father’s poor health. His health is what I remember most as I neared my twenties; I can see my mother walking with him after he had his first stroke, helping him cross the street to the church so he could attend mass with her. She never wavered in her care of him. She took care of her blind mother before she met my father, and then my father and us children after her marriage. It is her faith, loyalty and devotion that stand out in my mind to this day. She had the strength and courage to live her life the way she felt it should be lived. She found grace in the small things; she did not seek the limelight nor would she have been comfortable there. The older I get, when I think about who are the heroes in my life, they are my parents. Their lives were far from perfect, but their faith in God and in each other did not disappear. No matter what private doubts they may have had from time to time, they stayed true to each other and to us. That is all that matters in this life. Nothing else—not worldly glory or fame or money. What matters to me is that the connection to my parents remains strong even though they are no longer physically alive. But they are very much alive in my heart and soul.
Later on, when I was standing in the kitchen cutting up a pumpkin to prepare puree, I remembered how much my mother loved the autumn, how much energy it gave her for new projects. I was feeling that way the entire weekend. Whenever I have worked in the garden, I have felt her presence as well, and that is no surprise since she loved planting her own garden in the spring. A small flower garden, but one she was very proud of and that looked so lovely each year. She planted morning glories at the base of the lampposts so that they would have a post to climb as they grew. She planted a trellis on the side of the apartment building we lived in, and grew red roses there. And she ordered her tulip bulbs from Holland each year from a catalog company I don’t remember the name of. Whenever I hear the birds in my own garden, I am reminded of my mother’s love of birds. She would watch them from our kitchen window as they gathered in the dogwood tree outside the window, and during the winter she made sure they had enough food.
I think of my father too, when I am sitting at the dinner table with my husband and we are discussing different world situations. It reminds me of all the times I sat with my father after dinner and discussed the state of the world with him. That was when I was growing up in the 1970s. In the 1980s, when I was working in Manhattan, I would sometimes meet him for lunch since he worked there as well, and we would wander over to St. Francis of Assisi church on West 31st Street. I seem to remember that the church had a bookstore/gift shop then, and we would purchase a book or two and look forward to discussing them after we had read them. I checked the church’s website but could not find any mention of the bookstore, so perhaps it no longer exists or perhaps my memory is faulty. My father and I bonded over books and faith, and they led to spiritual and intellectual discussions that buoyed me through my teenage years. He was my link to the outside world and to the work world. He died over thirty years ago, a lifetime in so many respects. Yet that connection too remains strong.
Books are the portals that allow me to connect to my parents. I remember them individually and together. I was closest to my father when I was a teenager, and when he died, I grew very close to my mother. As a child, I remember them as a couple, sitting together in the evening reading their individual books. Before my father’s health diminished him, he would sometimes tease my mother or chase her around the dining room table. That vision sticks in my mind—that they had their happy moments in the middle of their trying times, mostly due to my father’s poor health. His health is what I remember most as I neared my twenties; I can see my mother walking with him after he had his first stroke, helping him cross the street to the church so he could attend mass with her. She never wavered in her care of him. She took care of her blind mother before she met my father, and then my father and us children after her marriage. It is her faith, loyalty and devotion that stand out in my mind to this day. She had the strength and courage to live her life the way she felt it should be lived. She found grace in the small things; she did not seek the limelight nor would she have been comfortable there. The older I get, when I think about who are the heroes in my life, they are my parents. Their lives were far from perfect, but their faith in God and in each other did not disappear. No matter what private doubts they may have had from time to time, they stayed true to each other and to us. That is all that matters in this life. Nothing else—not worldly glory or fame or money. What matters to me is that the connection to my parents remains strong even though they are no longer physically alive. But they are very much alive in my heart and soul.
Sunday, September 11, 2016
Reclaiming the best parts of ourselves
Getting older is about reclaiming the best parts of ourselves, the parts that we discovered as teenagers but then buried for fear that they might be ridiculed or destroyed. Or possibly because we felt sure that no one would understand us if we expressed them. Because the world that we grew up in, while less intense in terms of social media pressure compared to today's world, was every bit as intense when it came to ‘fitting in’ or ‘assuming’ personalities that were acceptable to society. Some of those personalities included career woman, feminist, wife, mother, successful man, husband, and father—all of the things that we had to deal with and make choices about in our 20s and 30s. But I remember my teenage years; they were about self-discovery and about wanting to find the path inward to my soul after reading St. Teresa of Avila’s book The Interior Castle or The Mansions. She described seven different rooms that a person had to move through in order to find God. Those years were about intense emotions, strange new feelings, spiritual exploration and even an interest in the mystical; questions about life’s meaning, our purpose on this earth, and our place in the universe. But after I left those years, I entered another world, one that required that I fit in, work for a living, contribute to society in one form or another, and be responsible. I have done and do all those things still. But I long to clear the decks, to make room once again for the young woman trying to find her way in the world, discovering new areas inside herself, before responsibility, duty and work took over.
That young woman was a writer; she wrote poetry on a daily basis, as well as short stories. She was a reader; she loved sci-fi and crime novels, English literature and poetry. She wanted to be like her father and mother, both avid readers. She talked to them about what she read, and they in turn did the same with her and suggested books for her to read. She read Thomas Hardy’s novel Jude the Obscure (her father was a Thomas Hardy fan and she became one too), and cried at the end of that novel when Jude died alone. She remembers wandering into the living room where she found her father to share that sadness; that memory stands out because he understood how she felt, like he understood so much of who she was when she was young. He always listened to her; that was his gift to others—the ability to listen well. Her female friends loved him as he always made them feel welcome and accepted. He understood that life was unfair (because he had experienced it himself) and that Thomas Hardy was able to write about that unfairness in a way that appealed to him and to her. Her father died when she was 29 years old; he died too young. She remembers driving home to the Bronx the evening he died, a wall of grief all around her. It almost seemed real, as though the car that she was driving would smash against it. That too is a memory that she recalls clearly all these years later. He never got a chance to see the woman she became or the woman she is now. The woman who is returning to her literary roots, planted by her parents, who were gardeners of all things literary. She is returning to her roots in other ways as well—as a proud American with a new interest in American history, trying to sort out all that makes America a great country. She loves returning to her hometown where she was born and seeing the changes as it moves on without her. She is not nostalgic for the past. Yet so much of Tarrytown remains the Tarrytown of her memories—the Tarrytown Lakes, the Hudson River estates, the river itself, Rockwood State Park—all the places that left their imprint on her heart and soul when she was a teenager. She spent a lot of time alone as a teenager, and understands only now the purpose for that. That solitude was a gift to her in the midst of much that was sad around her--her father’s illnesses, family crises, unemployment and uncertainty. It became something to seek after when she entered her 20s and 30s, knowing full well that she would not find much of it during those years. Even in her 40s, there was little in the way of solitude, because each waking minute was occupied by daily home and work routines. But when she entered her 50s, her world changed, for reasons she is still not quite clear about. The need for solitude re-emerged, stronger than ever. Solitude became something to fight for, to defend; it became a meaning for living—a purpose. It was suddenly very important to ‘have a room of one’s own’ so that solitude could be ensured. That meant being firm about the need for that; it meant not giving in to what others wanted immediately. It meant being selfish in a good way; putting one’s ideas, dreams and wishes first, for once. It meant not sacrificing what was important to oneself. Because without solitude, there is no chance to discover or rediscover oneself, to examine one’s life, to find the special meaning in one’s life. It was Socrates who said, “The unexamined life is not worth living”. She understood that as a teenager, and now again as a woman moving toward her 60s.
That young woman was a writer; she wrote poetry on a daily basis, as well as short stories. She was a reader; she loved sci-fi and crime novels, English literature and poetry. She wanted to be like her father and mother, both avid readers. She talked to them about what she read, and they in turn did the same with her and suggested books for her to read. She read Thomas Hardy’s novel Jude the Obscure (her father was a Thomas Hardy fan and she became one too), and cried at the end of that novel when Jude died alone. She remembers wandering into the living room where she found her father to share that sadness; that memory stands out because he understood how she felt, like he understood so much of who she was when she was young. He always listened to her; that was his gift to others—the ability to listen well. Her female friends loved him as he always made them feel welcome and accepted. He understood that life was unfair (because he had experienced it himself) and that Thomas Hardy was able to write about that unfairness in a way that appealed to him and to her. Her father died when she was 29 years old; he died too young. She remembers driving home to the Bronx the evening he died, a wall of grief all around her. It almost seemed real, as though the car that she was driving would smash against it. That too is a memory that she recalls clearly all these years later. He never got a chance to see the woman she became or the woman she is now. The woman who is returning to her literary roots, planted by her parents, who were gardeners of all things literary. She is returning to her roots in other ways as well—as a proud American with a new interest in American history, trying to sort out all that makes America a great country. She loves returning to her hometown where she was born and seeing the changes as it moves on without her. She is not nostalgic for the past. Yet so much of Tarrytown remains the Tarrytown of her memories—the Tarrytown Lakes, the Hudson River estates, the river itself, Rockwood State Park—all the places that left their imprint on her heart and soul when she was a teenager. She spent a lot of time alone as a teenager, and understands only now the purpose for that. That solitude was a gift to her in the midst of much that was sad around her--her father’s illnesses, family crises, unemployment and uncertainty. It became something to seek after when she entered her 20s and 30s, knowing full well that she would not find much of it during those years. Even in her 40s, there was little in the way of solitude, because each waking minute was occupied by daily home and work routines. But when she entered her 50s, her world changed, for reasons she is still not quite clear about. The need for solitude re-emerged, stronger than ever. Solitude became something to fight for, to defend; it became a meaning for living—a purpose. It was suddenly very important to ‘have a room of one’s own’ so that solitude could be ensured. That meant being firm about the need for that; it meant not giving in to what others wanted immediately. It meant being selfish in a good way; putting one’s ideas, dreams and wishes first, for once. It meant not sacrificing what was important to oneself. Because without solitude, there is no chance to discover or rediscover oneself, to examine one’s life, to find the special meaning in one’s life. It was Socrates who said, “The unexamined life is not worth living”. She understood that as a teenager, and now again as a woman moving toward her 60s.
Saturday, July 25, 2015
Thirty years ago today
Today, July 25th, would have been my father’s 97th
birthday had he lived. He passed away thirty years ago, in March 1985. There is
not a day goes by that I don’t think about him or my mother, who passed away in
March 2001. I always remember my father’s birthday now, because my cousin Karen
is born on the same day; when we were children, it was the opposite way around—I
remembered her birthday when my dad’s birthday rolled around.
Thirty years. The passage of time. I remember my father and my
mother in ways I never knew existed when I was younger, because I could not
imagine them gone at that time. My father was 67 years old when he died; that’s
young. They are both a part of me; I need only scratch the surface of
my heart, mind and soul and they are there, waiting to talk to me.
My parents married on July 9th, 1955, sixty years
ago. Their thirtieth wedding anniversary was within reach when my father passed
away. It seems like a short amount of time for them to be married when I look
back now (my husband and are nearing twenty-five years married), but they had
married later in life and became parents in their late thirties. I was
remembering one of the things we children used to do for my parents when their
wedding anniversary came around each year. We would buy a box of M&M
candies, vanilla ice cream and cantaloupe, cut the cantaloupe in half, scoop
out the seeds, and fill each half with ice cream and M&Ms. Our anniversary
gift to them, at least for three or four years. The last thing my father probably needed was to eat ice cream
full of saturated fats given his health problems, but he ate it because we made
it for them. That was the kind of dad he was. As I peruse his reading list and
write about it for my blog, I feel my father’s presence in my life. I welcome
those memories and feelings.
Sunday, June 15, 2014
On Father’s Day, remembering my father and my mother
There was
little in the way of material wealth in the family in which I grew up. My
parents were not rich nor were they particularly preoccupied with accumulating
wealth in their lifetimes. Sometimes I wish they had been better at financial
planning or at saving for retirement, but they weren’t. We had the things we
needed, but no more. When times were financially difficult in our family, we
felt it. My parents made mistakes in that regard in terms of saving money for
uncertain times, and my father would have been the first one to admit that. But
by the time he understood that, his health was poor and there was little he
could have done to reverse the course of things. We managed, but there was
never really enough left over to secure a comfortable future for them when they
got older. As fate would have it, my father passed away in his late 60s,
leaving my mother alone for what should have been their retirement years spent
doing enjoyable things together. But that was not to be.
My parents
were preoccupied with other things than money and career—books mostly, during
their lives. They loved to read, and they shared their thoughts about what they
read with us. My father especially was an avid reader, and he and I would often
walk together on summer evenings when I was a teenager and discuss books and
life in general. He and my mother also enjoyed classical music and shared that
with us as well. They read newspapers and we discussed politics and current
events at the dinner table. We did not get together often with extended family,
but our friends were always welcome, and in that regard, the door to our house
was always open. It never seemed as though we lacked for much, and I did not
compare what we had to what our friends had. I was never particularly
interested in doing that. It always seemed to me that some people had more money
and material things, and some people didn’t. That was just the way life was; I
rarely pondered it when I was a child or teenager. But the difficult times in
our family, e.g., when my father was unemployed for nearly two years and his
subsequent gradual decline in health, taught me to be independent and to not
rely on other to support me financially. So the hard times did have an
influence on my adult career choices, and I do feel that I made the right
decisions when it came to pursuing a career.
On Father’s
Day, I cannot remember my father without remembering my mother, who passed away
sixteen years after he did. During her life, my mother did what she needed to
do for herself and for my father; she did it without much fuss or talk. She was
a doer, not a talker. She took good care of my father and of us, but his
cardiovascular disease had its roots already in his late teens as a result of a
ruptured appendix that nearly killed him. His illness manifested itself in his
early 50s, with his first heart attack at the age of 52. In response to this,
my mother prepared low-fat meals which we all ate. We mostly ate lean baked
chicken, lean cuts of beef, and fish. Sometimes she would make pork chops or
tuna casserole. There were never heavy cream sauces or gravies to accompany the
meats or fish. We rarely ate mayonnaise, ice cream or drank whole milk. My
parents would drive to the local farm stands during the summer to stock up on fruits
and vegetables; that was an important part of summer meals. My mother ate very
little in the way of dessert and rarely snacked on junk food and there was not
much of either one in our house. She did buy cookies and cupcakes for us to eat
as snacks after school when we were children, but they were regulated—we were
allowed one or two and that was all. We were not allowed to raid the
refrigerator at will; the refrigerator was off limits once we had eaten our
snacks. In that way, she controlled the amount of food we put into ourselves.
Dessert after dinner on weeknights might be Jell-o with fruit, or a few
cookies. On Sundays, we usually had a lemon sponge cake from the local bakery
for dessert; she also made a great lemon cake drizzled with lemon juice. When I
think back to the way she ate, I realize that she ate a bit of everything, but
she did so in moderation. She never overate; she never overdid anything when it
came to food. She was more the type to make sure that others were full before
she was. But that could also have been her way of ensuring that she did not
overeat. She drank a lot of water, loved her black tea, and drank a couple of
cups of coffee per day. Breakfast for her was toast and tea. When she and I
would go out to eat (when she was in her 70s), we usually found the local diner
and ordered ourselves grilled cheese sandwiches with cole slaw on the side and
a cup of tea. That was enough for the both of us.
My mother
was a great walker for most of her life. She didn’t learn to drive until she
was around 65 years old, and even then, when she got her license, she drove for
a couple of years around town, and then gave up driving and sold her car. We
often wondered why she did that; I think it was because she missed walking
around town. She understood that she was onto something by walking. She didn’t
turn down the offer of a ride if she had a lot of groceries to shop for,
especially as she got older. But she looked forward to getting outside to walk,
in all types of weather. Rain never bothered her, ditto for snow. She was in
good shape for most of her life, rarely sick, not overweight (she was
slender)—and she didn’t look her age. She was proud of that. When I look back
at what mattered to her in the way of her personal health, I know now that my
mother was interested in taking care of herself long before it became trendy to
do so. She never announced it with fanfare; she was not an ardent missionary
for the cause nor did she nag others to ‘see it her way’. She just did it. She
would just say she was going to the supermarket to pick up a few items, and
that was one of her several walks for the day. Sometimes we joined her,
sometimes not. It didn’t matter to her if she walked alone; she enjoyed it. All
these years later, I realize she was on the right track when it came to eating
and taking care of herself. My mother was a quiet instigator of change. I
appreciate her simple wisdom and ways of doing things, more and more as I get
older. Her legacy lives on in the way I approach my life and in my approach to
getting older. I wish my parents had lived longer. I got to know each of them
first together, as my parents, and then separately as I spent time with each of
them individually. I am grateful for the time I was able to spend with each of
them.
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