In memory of our mom, Bertie (Sunday, May 13, 2007) ...
released by 1-800-FLOWERS.COM
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Looking at our Mom and Dad from our present lens and wondering about their relationship in today’s terms isn’t really valid.
For one thing, I don’t have a clue as to what their relationship was in terms of intimacy. Pretty good, in a sense, I think, as six kids were the result, but their communication was a little hidden from us.
In those days, issues weren't discussed like the comings and goings of life and surely not things that were family matters.
There were no family conferences to attack whatever the issue of the day might be. It was a benevolent dictatorship for sure.
Mom could stop you in your tracks with a look and she had an astute perception of the world that few had in my view. Even as a youngster, I can remember thinking, how did she know that?
I don't remember ever seeing her read, although there were always newspapers around and my Dad seemed to be pouring over something constantly. Maybe they were discussing all of this between intimacies, I don't know but she knew things.
Later on when we finally could buy a TV, she watched it constantly.
When I was in college, she would call me up and chew me out for not coming home more often. I would load in my old 49 Ford and get home and then after greeting and eating, she was back watching her soaps. Early on, as I was half-listening to her talk about people, I would wonder, “Who are these folks?” Later on, I would discover that she was talking about her soaps.
She watched Jesse Helms religiously who was on TV almost every night usually touting one conservative cause after another. When he ran for office, she got out of her sick bed to go vote for him.
We were farmers and hard work was the order of the day. We would get up before dawn, eat a hearty breakfast, and go work in the fields.
We might or might not come back for lunch, more likely than not, no. If we ate at all, it was a biscuit, maybe some country ham sandwiched between that biscuit, plenty of water, and often ice tea in a mason jar.
When we all piled in at suppertime, it was a table ready for a group of hungry farmers. Much of these memories are surmised as my real work in the fields came after my brothers were no longer around.
My oldest brother, Raz, went to war and Corb went to a real job. Farming for the family was never considered a real job—it was what you did. If you needed to earn money, you went to work somewhere else like the mill, a store, or anywhere that one could be paid the cold cash.
Our coming of age and leaving home was always a matter of great trauma to Ma. Everytime one of us left, it seemed like a little piece of her disappeared. But, when we returned for a visit, we were welcomed with an big Sunday lunch with two or three meats, all kinds of vegetables and desserts including her famous homemade biscuits and molasses.
Mom was fiercely loyal to her family, sometimes maybe when she should have been more pragmatic. And, often the only side she saw belonged to her family. There was a feeling from the beginning that our Mom was the haven of rest in any storm.
Mom ruled. Most folks seem to think that men rule the household; when, in fact, it is the women. Mom knew about hard work, responsibility, and money. She knew how to keep six children, including five boys, fed, clothed, and disciplined with what little resources she had.
I’ve often wondered, where in the world she would be if she had been formally educated.
Happy Mothers Day, Mom. Your children, will always be greatful.
Draft excerpt from the soon to published memoir
The Way It Was by Raz and Jerry Autry
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