memories Archives - Page 11 of 18

Sep 15, 2010

Ninety and Still Going

My grandmother (my mom’s mom) has had a long and full life of ups and downs. She was born to a farm family, and from the stories she was told, she was lucky she was a happy, easy-going baby. She spent her earliest days left on a bed, her mother too busy watching the other children and doing the chores that needed done on a farm to spend a lot of time with the tiny baby who stayed so quiet.

She grew up in the Great Depression, and remembers going to the only store in her tiny village, trading what little their farm produced in exchange for flour, sugar, and other necessities for a family to survive. They reused everything and made do with what little they had. She also met my grandfather in that small farming community.

During World War II, she joined the WAVES, the female support staff of the US Navy, while my grandfather served as a fighter pilot in the Canadian Royal Air Force, and then in the US Air Force once the US joined the war.

After the war, they married and returned to their small rural Ohio community where they raised livestock as well as three daughters. Even in the 1950’s, she still had no indoor plumbing, getting her water from a well outside the house. Cooking a chicken for dinner involved grabbing a chicken from the yard, cutting its head off, and then plucking it and preparing it for dinner.

Eventually they moved to a house in the nearby village – with indoor plumbing – and my grandmother became a secretary while my grandfather went into law enforcement and eventually become the sheriff of the county. They pushed their daughters to further their education, to become women who would make a difference in the world, with one earning an MBA and another her PhD. The third earned only an Associates degree, but she gave them a different and just as precious gift: a granddaughter.

Then, in 1976, just months before I was to be born, my grandmother lost her husband to a heart attack. She’s been alone ever since.

And yet she hasn’t been alone. For a short while my mother and I lived with her. And even after my mom was able to afford her own place, we were only two towns away from that tiny village and visited often. Her other daughters have remained close, too. In the past six years, she’s seen her two great-granddaughters born, and where she remained more distant in my upbringing, she’s increasingly warm towards my girls and enjoys watching their silliness.

She has traveled the world with her daughters and her friends, enjoyed her hobbies, and maintained a level of independence that baffles even me. Her life experience has given her a hard exterior – she’s a happy person, but she sees no point in being overly emotional. Depression and exuberance are equally useless to her. She believes in a strong work ethic and the simple morals of being honest and good to people.

This spring, my grandmother had a stroke, and suddenly the family was hit with the realization that this woman of steel was mortal. Amazingly, she bounced back from the stroke, fighting her way through rehab in order to get back to her own house again. She gave up the two-story house in that tiny village a few years ago, now living in the single-story house I grew up in so that my mother is closer to her. This is a good thing, as the stroke has left her weaker, more tired. But she still insists on living by herself, independently.

Today, my grandmother turned ninety years old. 9-0. At ninety years old, she still lives alone, drives her own car, and makes her own meals. She’s been a widow for 34 years now – longer than the time she was married to my grandfather. And while she sometimes repeats the same story over and over, forgetting that she’s told us before and we already understand the message in it, her mind is mostly clear and sharp despite ninety years worth of experiences crowding the space.

I don’t know how much longer she’ll be with us. My grandmother is slowing down, looking more frail every day. And while we haven’t always seen eye-to-eye (my teenage years were rough on both of us), I do respect the tremendous amount of knowledge and experience she has. I only hope I can take advantage of the time we have left to preserve more of her stories, her history, so my daughters can someday know more about the woman they call G-G.

Happy birthday, grandma. You made it to ninety, just like you said you would at your eightieth birthday party.

Filed Under: daily life, family time, love, memories ·

Jul 26, 2010

Single Parents, I Salute You

By Christina ·

I don’t know how you do it.

Seriously.

You all deserve a medal. Or a hug. Or a national holiday in your honor, with guaranteed babysitting for the day so you can lounge poolside and have a margarita without worrying if your kid is too close to the edge of the pool.

I’m just finishing up a six day solo-parenting gig and I’m exhausted. (Aaron was in California at San Diego Comic-Con, where ironically the weather was much cooler than the melt-your-face-off heat wave we had in Ohio.) I love my children dearly, but nothing tests your love for your children quite like 6 days alone with them.

Actually, it wouldn’t have been so bad if I wasn’t on a nocturnal schedule due to my job, and my children weren’t on a beat-the-rooster-to-the-punch schedule. This equated to mommy dragging her tired self downstairs before the sun was up, making them breakfast, turning on the TV, and then collapsing on the couch while promising extra gummy snacks at lunch to whichever child could be the quietest for the next couple of hours. You might be surprised how many “who can be the quietest” game rewards you can think up when you’re half-delirious from sleep deprivation.

I was raised by a single mom, so you’d think I’d have some tricks on how to do it solo. Growing up, my mom worked 40+ hours a week, cooked meals, cleaned our house, paid bills, mowed the lawn, helped me with my school homework, went grocery shopping, attended my school events, and yet somehow still had time to sit on the couch with me and watch TV in the evenings. I’m convinced she’s secretly a cyborg who doesn’t require sleep.

Yet six days proved me to be nothing like her. I was short with my girls more than once. OK, more than once each day. Maybe even each hour, depending on the time of day. At times I felt like they were trying to make me lose my temper. The house did not stay clean. The laundry did not get done until Cordy ran out of shorts to wear. Paper plates became my best friends. On the third day, Cordy cried that she missed her daddy when I yelled at her. I didn’t cry about missing him until the fifth day.

But the end is now in sight. And we did have some fun during these six days, too. We made ice cream together. We went shopping for toys and t-shirts at the Disney store in the mall. (Mira then begged to go into Victoria’s Secret when we walked past it – uh-oh.) We sat together in a heap on the couch and read Thomas the Tank Engine stories. We had dinner with grandma one night, where the girls performed the “I love grandma and mommy” dance for us. Cordy drew a picture of us with a heart above us and the words “I love you mom” written below, asking me to display it to work. (I did.) And each night I tucked each of them into bed and kissed them goodnight, reminding them that even though we sometimes get upset with each other, I will always love them no matter what.

It wasn’t so bad. But I’m still glad I don’t have to do it longer than six days. And I’m looking forward to getting my time away at BlogHer next week.

Filed Under: Aaron, being a mom, daily life, domestic zero, memories · Tagged: mean mommy

Jul 13, 2010

Full Circle

By Christina ·

It was almost exactly four years ago that our house was robbed. A man living across the street from us watched our house carefully, finding the one day of the week when no one was home for several hours and then broke our back window and helped himself to everything of value.

The new laptop I had purchased just three days prior – intended for my first BlogHer trip – was gone, along with Aaron’s laptop, our game systems and games, the video camera, and several other small electronics. The videos of Cordy’s first steps and silly moments were on the tapes he took with the camera. My engagement ring – set out to be re-sized – was stolen as well.

None of those items were ever recovered, even though we provided the serial numbers for everything. But thanks to my eye for tiny details, I spied a small drop of blood on the curtain, and it was through that speck of DNA evidence that the thief was caught several months later.

However, even being a repeat offender doesn’t guarantee more than a slap on the wrist, and the thief was released on probation, with a restraining order preventing him from coming near us or our house for 5 years. The final part of his sentence was a requirement that he pay us for our insurance deductible.

We never expected to see the money. Truthfully, I didn’t even care about the money. My sense of security had been shattered and I didn’t even feel safe in my own home. We always take precautions of locking doors and windows, but it wasn’t until then that security systems or other additional precautions to protect our home had even crossed my mind. Replacing the items we lost was costly, but the greater cost to me was in trying to replace any comfort I felt while at home.

As the years have passed, the sharp emotions of that day have dulled. Of course, we keep the house locked up and protected more than ever now, but I’m no longer waking up in a panic in the middle of the night, double-checking locks and systems I know are secure. Most of the items that were stolen were replaced.

But this past week, a letter arrived in the mail from the courts addressed to Aaron. I was completely puzzled, wondering if we had done something wrong, like missed a parking ticket or something like that. Instead, I opened the envelope and found a check for the same amount as our insurance deductible, with a receipt stating it was a restitution payment from the thief!

I never expected to see that money. Holding that check gave me just a little more faith in karma and in the system. It added one tiny bit of closure to an otherwise painful memory, and it just happened to show up during a time when we really need it, too. I only hope that the thief has used this past four years to turn his life around, finding a productive manner of contributing to society instead of shattering windows to take treasured belongings – and peace of mind – from others. Or at the very least, that he no longer lives anywhere near us and never comes into our neighborhood again.

Filed Under: daily life, memories · Tagged: idiots

Jul 6, 2010

A Tale of Two Girls (and One Dress)

By Christina ·

One advantage of having two daughters? Re-using some of the cutest outfits. And then comparing photos of them in said cute outfits.

Today’s dress? A lovely orange and yellow floral dress bought for Cordy by her Aunt Katie.

Now worn by Mira.

(Why must she always give me the “Are you kidding me?” look when I ask her to smile?)

Age difference – almost a year and a half. Cordy wore it at 19 months and it was nearly too tight. Mira now wears it at 3 years old and it’s nearly too tight.

It’s a size 3.

They’re both Amazons in their own way. And yet again I have another dress that I never want to get rid of.

Filed Under: Amazons, Cordy, memories, Mira ·

May 10, 2010

Quality Time

By Christina ·

It’s a tradition in my family to always pick out funny cards for any occasion, including Mother’s Day. So I was quite proud of my accomplishment this year, when I selected a card that read on the outside: “Mom, now that I’m a parent, I understand what you went through in raising me…” On the inside: “Hell. Happy Mother’s Day.”

I know I wasn’t the easiest kid to deal with, and I’m glad my mom had the patience to deal with a kid who was really too smart for her own good.

I never suspected that my mother had any regrets in how she raised me. After all, I graduated near the top of my class, attended a well-respected university where I graduated with honors, spent a summer studying in England, married, bought a house, and gave birth to two beautiful daughters of my own. Sure, I’ve got my share of problems, too, but I thought mom had to be pretty proud of her job as mother. In fact, I often wondered how I could ever measure up to her standard in raising my own children.

A few years ago, mom gave me a small piece of advice that made me realize that no matter how well we do, guilt can plague any mother. I don’t remember how the conversation came up, but at one point she became very serious and told me, “Just promise me one thing: when your daughter is sick, take your sick time and be with her. Because no matter what’s going on at work, no matter your deadlines or how much people say they need you to come in that day, they don’t need you as much as your kid.”

Truer words never spoken.

My mom went on to say that she regrets not staying home with me more when I was sick. Instead, she would go to work, believing that they needed her more at work. She usually called in my grandmother to be with me for the day. But she was right – I didn’t want my grandmother, I wanted my mom. My mom was the one I felt most comfortable with, and even though it was the same Campbell’s canned soup, chicken-noodle soup somehow tasted better when my mom made it.

When she retired a few years ago, she had nearly a year of sick time saved up from her 30 years of service. One year. And she could only cash out a tiny fraction of that time. She looked at that lost time as lost opportunity to be with me when I needed her. I’ve tried to tell her that I understood that she needed to work, but I don’t think she’s fully forgiven herself for it. I sometimes think she is trying to make up for that time by spending more time with her granddaughters now.

And so I’ve taken her advice and vowed to spend as much quality time with Cordy and Mira as I can. When one of them is sick, I do all I can to be there for them. And I remember that work will come and go, but nothing can replace the comfort a mother can provide to her children.

Happy Mother’s Day, mom. You probably don’t believe me, but I do actually hear your advice. Sometimes I even follow it. And I want you to know that while we may not have had as much time together as we both would have liked when I was a kid, it was always quality time.