Thursday Tidbits

Posted on May 24, 2018 under Thursday Tidbits with one comment

Pearls of wisdom.

With shocking regularity, we are witnessing the end of an era as many well-known Antigonish area women have completed their earthly toil. And oh, how they toiled.

I wasn’t the only one thinking about mothers last week when I wrote about my mom’s death. Besides words of comfort, many of you took the time to speak about your own mothers, many praising them effusively. I have culled some of your comments to give you a flavour of what came across my computer.

“I was also blessed with a warm and caring mom and was lucky that I could sit beside her bed when she died, nine days before her 100^th birthday. But mothers like that never really leave you. They stay with you as long as you live. So, in a sense, they never die but live on in our memories and stay with us all of our lives.”

Someone chose a nautical metaphor. A ship leaves the harbor under full sail. “I stand and watch her at length until she hangs like a speck of white cloud just where the sea and sky come to mingle with each other. Then someone at my side says: “There, she is gone!” “Gone where?” “Gone from my sight.” The ship disappears over the horizon but it hasn’t gone forever. We just can’t see it. It’s sort of like losing a loved one. We can’t see them but we know they’re with us. They’re just beyond the horizon.

The next one struck me hard as well. Why is it that mothers are revered and often there is nary a mention of our fathers? “On reading the tribute to your mom, I couldn’t help thinking this too sounds so much like my mom, ladies of a generation who despite all that may have been hard, their character, grace, humour, and prayerful gratitude, made them such unique mamas. Sometimes I’ll offer a silent apology to dad (who died some time ago) that he doesn’t jump into my thoughts the way mom does.”

The past week brought about a lot of reminiscing. If you’re over 65, take a look at this list and put a check mark beside everyone you recognize:

Hot poultices for boils; Lestoil; cod liver oil pills; sunlight soap; iron on patches on the knees of blue jeans; 30 pound turkey in the oven at Christmas; cardboard boxes of meat from John D’s Meat Market; shoes lined up on newspaper the night before mass and polished with Scuff Coat; rinso; starlac; margarine with a belly button; choco; Perry Como; JFK; cherry blossoms; the electric hot plate on the floor with Friar’s balsam simmering away in a steel pot; sifting bugs out of the flour bin; Radio brand green peas; Lenten decades of the rosary; Lowney’s pail of hard candy that would stick together inside your Christmas stocking; the diaper pail; the wringer washer; Vince the milkman; Angus “the beard”; three digit telephone number; having a diaper wrapped around your neck with over a healthy dose of Vick’s vapo rub to ease the pain in your throat.

This is just a partial list.

So there, not a single creative thought from me. I stole all these things from you.

I’ll leave you with this quote from Mark Twain that was sent to me as well:

“My mother had a slender, small body but a large heart; a heart so large that everybody’s joys found welcome in it, and hospitable accommodation.”

Have a great weekend.

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