By Pat Gracey
Mother's Day, Revisited
The Spirit of Tehachapi
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Someone said, “Why don’t you write something about Mother’s Day?” The day has already passed but that’s ok. Well, let’s see, it’s kind of nice that a woman named Ann Reeves Jarvis, back in the Nineteenth Century, thought there should be a special day of recognition for all Moms. It wasn’t until 1914 that President Woodrow Wilson declared it a special day to be celebrated on the second Sunday of May. Not only that, Ann Jarvis later said that due to the commercializing of the day and the profiteering of merchants, she wished she’d never thought of it. Since that information doesn’t exactly have folks anxiously awaiting further words, I will revert to my many memories of being a Mom.
I recall one evening after all the kids were in bed and hubby and I were watching something on TV before retiring. A little voice cried out from the bedroom, “Mom, I just remembered I “gotta” write an essay about Abraham Lincoln. It’s due tomorrow.” That’s a little unsettling but I tell him to go to sleep and we’d find some facts in the morning. Now, you know, in those precomputer days, Mom will find “old Abe” in the encyclopedia and get sonny up a little early to begin his masterpiece.
Oh yes, remember that sound in the middle of the night? A sound that will live in infamy! “Barf! Barf! Barf!” Somebody is sick and vomiting in their bed. That means a change of sheets and a bath for the sick kid. Sometimes, if there is a high temperature it bears watching so you don’t go back to bed at all.
There is another sound in the night that reminds one of feeding the seals at the zoo. This sound is “bark! bark! bark!” Croup is the name given for that sound. Did’ja ever make a croup tent? I have. Also, in my day as a young mother, there was a book written by Dr. Benjamin Spock. Every mother had one. He listed symptoms of various ailments and when reading about croup he recommends a croup tent. Then he says, one type of croup can be fatal. Oh gee, Dr. Spock! We bundle the kid up and take him out to the Military Hospital on the base.
We had multiple children so one parent stays home while the other takes the ailing child to the doctor. Now, if I were the one showing up at the emergency room, a young Corpsman, is required to ask , “Why do you consider this an emergency that could not have waited for your child to be seen during the day?” You patiently explain that the child is barking like a seal and has a 104 temperature. Please understand that Corpsmen are the best people in the world and are just following rules. So, on those midnight trips one sometimes needs to make to the doctor, I used to send my husband. A seasoned Marine with years behind him and ribbons on his chest requires that they skip the preliminaries and treat the child. It’s magic.
Remember the heartfelt call, “Mom, could I have a drink of water? Not bathroom water, I want kitchen water!”
One other time, I received a call from the school. One of my five sons, was showing a friend how, when the wind was blowing, he could spit by the corner of a building and the spit would fly around the corner. A yard duty lady happened to be in the way of a spit. I received a call from the principal that the lady said it was on purpose. He was to spank my child with another teacher present. I wanted to say, “If you touch my child I will choke you to death with my bare hands.” Out loud I said, “Well, if you think it’s necessary.” That was some fifty or more years ago. Times change.
I remember many good times, happy times, funny times. Never to be traded for all the gold in the world. After coaching six children through them, I know my “times tables” all the way through the twelves! I know the Preamble to the Constitution, the Thirteen Colonies and how to make a “croup tent!”
Memories of the yesterdays are vivid as one travels back in time. Remembering the fateful day, Mother’s Day, arriving each year. Good days. I would hear God knows what’s going on in the kitchen. It’s all you can do to keep jumping up and preventing a disaster, but you don’t. The kiddies are cooking breakfast for Mom and serving it to her in bed. Here they come with a stone cold fried egg. They fried it about ten minutes before making the toast. Butter on the toast and jam on that. Orange juice and a doughnut. It‘s the thought that counts. The look on their faces made the midnight fevers, the “barfs” and “barks” all worth it.
Today, I get phone calls, cards, flowers and “stuff like that” from my grown kids on Mother’s Day.
