Things My Mother Taught Me

 

 
If you look in our kitchen cabinets you will notice that all the glasses are parked upside down. This is a throwback to my raising, and a mother who told us to place the glasses, cups, and mugs so to “keep the bugs out.” My mom was an excellent housekeeper, but no matter how pristine the kitchen might be, in our corner of Southeast Texas near the coast, all manner of creepy-crawly things would find their way into the cupboards. And so, to avoid having one of those giant flying roaches jumping into your face when you went to get a glass of water, we flipped ‘em over for safe storage against the varmints.

Recently, I was emptying the dishwasher at my parents’ house, and my 92-year-old mother admonished me to align the berries on the sides of the cereal bowls as I stacked them in her cupboard. So maybe there is a touch of OCD-ness there, too.

Mom taught me how to scramble eggs at the age of four, standing on a kitchen chair so that I could see the iron skillet on top of a gas range. I think this was in response to my failed attempts to successfully crack an egg for frying, and the ensuing mess was only fit for the scrambled variety. Mind you, all my cooking lessons were pre-microwave. We cooked by look and smell, texture and viscosity. Dishes were washed and dried by hand by me and my siblings.

Mom can still cook, although it takes her a little longer to get around in her “modern” kitchen. There’s an island in the middle the size of Manhattan, complete with electric cooktop, power outlets, and even a small sink. She’s graduated to microwave ovens and Keurig coffee makers, but still keeps a rudimentary can opener on the counter top. She prefers to hand-ladle cherry pie filling into a dough crust instead of Mrs. Smith’s boxed variety, and freezes every meal’s left overs for later use.

Things our mothers teach us last a lifetime.

Coming Home for Easter

 

The tree-shaded cul-de-sac looked familiar with neatly manicured lawns boasting the first blooms of Spring. I pulled into the driveway and turned to park under the porte-cochere. They didn’t notice my arrival, and so I parked and walked around the corner of the house. My parents stood at the doorway of their beloved greenhouse, hand in hand, observing the promises of a new growing season.

Mom’s walker was standing sentinel on the footbridge that provided access to the greenhouse—a kit structure Dad had purchased a few years earlier. It held all manner of exotic and not-so-exotic plants, the names of which I couldn’t begin to recount. But my parents knew them all by name, and my mother was gifted with the ability to coax to life anything with chlorophyll. My father complemented her skills with his undying discipline and precision in caring for the assortment. The result was a 10 x 15 oasis that harbored all manner of organisms of flora and fauna, the proof of which was an explosion of colors and new growth this early in the season.

And so they stood holding hands, my father leaning into the doorway, my mother pointing at something just beyond—a snapshot of how their time together has been for the past 69-years of their 93-year existence.

I had driven up to retrieve them for the long Easter weekend. Mom no longer drove, and Dad had finally accepted, begrudgingly, that the three-hour drive over the rivers and through the woods back to our house was a bit too much for the comfort level of his children. Never mind the fact he was nearly deaf in one ear. He was still confident in his abilities to drive, especially with a newer car “that practically drives itself,” he proudly proclaimed at his last checkup. Yet, he still insisted on driving a nearly ancient pickup truck that definitely did not drive itself.

The Easter weekend here provided my parents with a chance to see more of the family, including a recently engaged granddaughter and her fiancé, and a still somewhat shy great-grandson. Their visit, however, was too short, and the return trip home seemed to fly by. Dad commented that he noticed a lot of changes in the scenery along the way—probably a side benefit of not having to drive!

On my next visit, we’ll pull all of the plants out of the greenhouse and arrange them around the backyard, under a gazebo, and along a flagstone patio Dad laid by hand years ago. And they will sit under that gazebo and admire their handiwork and each other.

A COVID Christmas

 

So, it’s the night before Christmas, and down at the HEB
not a parking spot remains as far as the eye can see.
People are pretty jovial, in a gallows-humor kind of way,
They know there’s no such thing as Santa and his sleigh.

The bake shop is bustling, home-shoppers are hustling,
and the food samplers are holding sway;
‘Cause who doesn’t like free food while bumping elbows in the store on the night before Christmas Day?

This year’s Christmas is different in so many ways…
the anticipation of family together for a few days
has been shattered by diagnoses of COVID and such,
we’re not getting to spend that time together so much.

So, my wife swapped her kerchief for a face mask instead,
as she’s in quarantine--we must sleep in separate beds.
We watch separate TV’s, and sit five yards apart;  
this social distancing thing really is such a farce.

The stockings were hung from the mantle with care,
in hopes that our grand-kids soon would be there;
But COVID’s put a kabosh on our plans for family fare--
they’ve bugged out to Hempstead to spend their Christmas there.

We’re spending Christmas with each other and the nasty, ol' ‘VID;
watching holiday movies and swilling NyQuil, this illness to rid.
As for Fauci and the others who’ve politicized this craze--
We’ll have a Merry COVID Christmas in spite of you.

(With apologies to the estate of Clement Clarke Moore)