Figuring out my mother,and how she fit into our family life was a great deal more difficult than considering my father and what he was all about.In a sense,what you saw is what you got,with both of them,but in thinking back,my mother was both a good deal more circumspect,and much more complicated.You could easily have missed all the moving parts in her life,simply because there was a lot going on on the surface,and that could give you a good picture of her,but one that would have been very incomplete to my way of thinking.
Physically,my mother was small,but heavy and energetic,though not nearly as hyper kinetic as here mother.Her movements were smoother,more controlled,and did not come with a never ending soundtrack.She rose early in the morning,every morning and worked hard and diligently through until bedtime,whether she was caring for us children,tending to the house,or going out to provide for her family.She looked big to me back then only because all adults did,and she also carried enough force of personality to feel confident in all she was doing.There was no question of her lacking any needed control within the family.
Outwardly my mother seemed religious,and I don't think it was simply a matter of seeming that way.There was much about her religion that opened itself up to interpretation and even criticism,and I think that played out in our family from earliest days onward,but I would never question that she felt that it was necessary to have and actively pursue beliefs,and that those beliefs were purposely directed at leaving the world in a better state than she found it.Again,it was a matter of religion having a lot of moving parts,while seeming outwardly to be simple.So,she took us to church,but didn't necessarily deal well,and by that I mean,in a satisfying manner with the deeper,more problematic issues that religion implied.Overall,on the surface,she wasn't a philosopher,though she might well have made a good one,because she had a fine mind.She just seemed to see religion in a practical kind of way,a way to help her,and us to live as well as we could with others.And while this worked well for her,it was not always evident to me how you could take up belief in a pragmatic way,but leave aside the tougher questions that went with it.
While my mother was living in our family,she also had to have had a foot in another sort of place,a place I've taken to calling The World Just Beyond.The World Just Beyond was clearly a place that you could infer the presence of because it had an effect on the world that I was living in. But it contained,among other things,all those things that my mother was either clearly uncomfortable with,or did not know how to explain to her children,or did not think it appropriate to share with us,or perhaps with anyone.
There was the matter of where my mother came from too.It was such a very different place,on the surface much simpler,though I suspect that to be an illusion.That part of her background was very rural,some might even say backwards,and she tried very hard to be a creature of where she found herself,though I think at times she kept a foot in both worlds.And I'm sure she did so with intent,because I'm certain her moral code carried a great prohibition about forgetting where you come from.To use just a single word in describing her,I would say she was adaptable.Adaptability may never have had the very best of outcomes for her,but it made life anywhere manageable ,to the point that she could be satisfied,if not fulfilled.
As a child,I really could not apply religious principles to people,nor am I even sure that we should try.My mother knew a lot about how to get along in this world.That was as evident to me in 1966 as it was forty years later when she was taken from this world.There were things of note that might have caused me some wonder if I'd known more of Christian principles at the time,but they were never really things that caused any cataclysmic doubts or changes in the way I viewed her.Why was it,for instance that she would accept a drink or a smoke when offered,yet never touch either when left to her own devices? Why,if church was so important did we never go in the summertime? And why did she ever marry a man who would never go to church with us? Plus,there were all of those things that she never wanted to talk about,that I could never get answers to,that still seemed so important.All of this would follow me through all the years of my life,and,while the nature of my mothers belief was at time unfathomable I never doubted that she lived,and believed well,that she passed good things along to her children,and that she received a good reward.
Most likely the year 1966 was revealing her to have feet of clay as well.But,as with my father,that was nearly impossible to see.And it was to stay that way for many years longer,as she truly was the stronger of the two.
Physically,my mother was small,but heavy and energetic,though not nearly as hyper kinetic as here mother.Her movements were smoother,more controlled,and did not come with a never ending soundtrack.She rose early in the morning,every morning and worked hard and diligently through until bedtime,whether she was caring for us children,tending to the house,or going out to provide for her family.She looked big to me back then only because all adults did,and she also carried enough force of personality to feel confident in all she was doing.There was no question of her lacking any needed control within the family.
Outwardly my mother seemed religious,and I don't think it was simply a matter of seeming that way.There was much about her religion that opened itself up to interpretation and even criticism,and I think that played out in our family from earliest days onward,but I would never question that she felt that it was necessary to have and actively pursue beliefs,and that those beliefs were purposely directed at leaving the world in a better state than she found it.Again,it was a matter of religion having a lot of moving parts,while seeming outwardly to be simple.So,she took us to church,but didn't necessarily deal well,and by that I mean,in a satisfying manner with the deeper,more problematic issues that religion implied.Overall,on the surface,she wasn't a philosopher,though she might well have made a good one,because she had a fine mind.She just seemed to see religion in a practical kind of way,a way to help her,and us to live as well as we could with others.And while this worked well for her,it was not always evident to me how you could take up belief in a pragmatic way,but leave aside the tougher questions that went with it.
While my mother was living in our family,she also had to have had a foot in another sort of place,a place I've taken to calling The World Just Beyond.The World Just Beyond was clearly a place that you could infer the presence of because it had an effect on the world that I was living in. But it contained,among other things,all those things that my mother was either clearly uncomfortable with,or did not know how to explain to her children,or did not think it appropriate to share with us,or perhaps with anyone.
There was the matter of where my mother came from too.It was such a very different place,on the surface much simpler,though I suspect that to be an illusion.That part of her background was very rural,some might even say backwards,and she tried very hard to be a creature of where she found herself,though I think at times she kept a foot in both worlds.And I'm sure she did so with intent,because I'm certain her moral code carried a great prohibition about forgetting where you come from.To use just a single word in describing her,I would say she was adaptable.Adaptability may never have had the very best of outcomes for her,but it made life anywhere manageable ,to the point that she could be satisfied,if not fulfilled.
As a child,I really could not apply religious principles to people,nor am I even sure that we should try.My mother knew a lot about how to get along in this world.That was as evident to me in 1966 as it was forty years later when she was taken from this world.There were things of note that might have caused me some wonder if I'd known more of Christian principles at the time,but they were never really things that caused any cataclysmic doubts or changes in the way I viewed her.Why was it,for instance that she would accept a drink or a smoke when offered,yet never touch either when left to her own devices? Why,if church was so important did we never go in the summertime? And why did she ever marry a man who would never go to church with us? Plus,there were all of those things that she never wanted to talk about,that I could never get answers to,that still seemed so important.All of this would follow me through all the years of my life,and,while the nature of my mothers belief was at time unfathomable I never doubted that she lived,and believed well,that she passed good things along to her children,and that she received a good reward.
Most likely the year 1966 was revealing her to have feet of clay as well.But,as with my father,that was nearly impossible to see.And it was to stay that way for many years longer,as she truly was the stronger of the two.
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