I REMEMBER MOMMA

My recollections of her are tender and vivid. Perhaps the earliest memories of her are of being paraded about to friends and family to show off how well I could read. I was probably four or five and had no idea how to read, but I had memorized the nursery rhymes. They were memorized because she had read them to me so often that I could tell what to say by the pictures on the page.

She was always telling me what a "good boy" I was and I figured everyone had a mother like that. My self image remained high, because of her, until hormones, acne and the teen years kicked in and spoiled my perspective. Before that, if people didn’t like me, I didn’t really feel bad about myself. I figured they would like me if they really got to know me, because, after all, my Mother liked and loved me.

During all this, like most kids, we didn’t see Dad very much. Never mind that he was providing the books to "read" and the roof over our head and the food we ate. When I became a Dad myself and saw how much I was required to be away from the home and how much more "popular" my wife was in the eyes of our kids, I began to understand.

Moses Lake, Washington, kindergarten, our black cocker spaniel dog, Skipper, the trailer park manager, who made us get rid of Skipper, are all part of early memories. Once Mom baked a cake in our trailer stove and put me down for a nap. She told me to stay in bed and if I did as she asked, I would get an Eskimo Pie Ice Cream Bar, when she came back. Disregarding her instructions, I used my bed for a trampoline. The cake failed to rise, she came home, saw the fallen cake, knew I’d been up and about and refused to give me the ice cream. I cried and cried and to this day, can’t get enough of Eskimo Pies. Later, in Fresno, Calif., I remember getting lost looking for the ice cream man truck, but that’s a whole story by itself.

As my five brothers were born, I spent more and more time helping Mom do household chores and less and less time with her one on one. We got our first T.V. in Texas and I watched my first program, Hoppalong Cassidy, a kid’s western show. We did less talking with each other and more and more TV watching, sad in it’s own way. The realities of life really began to set in. I ironed, cooked, did the laundry, did the dishes, sweep & mopped the floor, babysat and on and on. It became drudgery, but served me well in my adult years as I was always able to keep house, when single and then do my share, when married. I had been trained.

Years passed. Adventures in Japan and Texas were too numerous to mention. I will say that I do remember the worst Christmas we ever had. We were living on Lackland AFB Texas, at 505 Kellack Road. Mother would hang out clothes on the line by the hour and then take them down and fold them. It was a tedious time consumer. Clothes dryers were the new thing. Mom longed for a dryer, unbeknownst to Dad.

Under the tree was a large wrapped box, about the size of a dryer. Mother just knew, her hanging clothes on the line days, were over. I was pretty excited about it too because I had to help her. The wrapping was pulled off the special package on Christmas Day, only to reveal a pump musical piano organ. Dad knew Mom loved music and was sure she would be thrilled to be able to learn how to play, but Mother was devastated. She cried. We cried and Dad was heartbroken. Nothing is quite like a gift well intended but not received in the same spirit. We all felt bad for both our parents, but we survived.