I want to remember . . . Journal prompt

Grand daughter, me and my mom, Oct 2014 at DaySpring FestiFall.
This was just 6 months after her disastrous knee surgery. And, no, she still does not color her hair!!!!

Today is my sweet mama's 81st birthday. There are so many things I have learned from her over the years. These are just a few that I always want to remember.

I want to remember . . . how she always put family before her own needs and desires. Even though Mama is in constant pain, she always manages to come through when any of us need her. Everything from cooking meals, doing laundry, babysitting her grandkids and great grandkids, picking up things from the grocery store, and thousands of other little things, she's always available.

I want to remember . . . the story of the terrible accident that she almost died from when she was only 18 years old, her miraculous recovery, and how that accident left her with chronic pain, that most people never knew about, for the rest of her life.

I want to remember . . . trying to learn to cook from her with no recipes and how that drove me nuts. Just put a little of this, a little of that, and you come out with perfect cornbread! That never worked for me.

I want to remember . . . that birthdays, holidays, anniversaries, graduations, may only exist as an excuse for a family dinner in which every one is invited and any friends who happen to show up are treated as family.

I want to remember . . . that dinner always begins with a prayer of thanksgiving before one bite is taken. And that forgetting that detail is cause for severe looks and possibly having your hand slapped before it reaches your mouth. (That hasn't happened in years but I still remember it like it was yesterday!)

I want to remember . . . the odd way she holds her cards when we play card games.

I want to remember . . . her long, slender fingers and beautiful fingernails that were always polished every Saturday night to match her outfit for Sunday morning, before arthritis twisted her knuckles and the nail polish was left to a younger generation.

I want to remember . . . how she and Daddy read their devotions together every night before they went to sleep when Daddy wasn't working night shift.

I want to remember . . . the million and one times she has come to my rescue for everything from restocking my pantry when there was more month than money, to demanding that I bring my laundry to her so she could wash it when my week was long and we were out of clean clothes.

I want to remember . . . the pure joy in her face the first time, and every time after that, when she held each of my children and grand children.

I want to remember . . . the compassionate sadness I saw in her eyes when one of my children had gone through a particular hard time and how she ached to rescue them.

I want to remember . . . how she drives me crazy with her OCD weird little habits . . . and how much I am like her.

I want to remember . . . the first time as a mom when I heard her voice come out of my mouth, and how much that both frightened me and made me proud to be her daughter.

I want to remember . . . her extensive knowledge of all things plant and flower related, and how much I have learned from her in that regard.

I want to remember . . . that the best tasting pot roast, pound cake, and lots of other foods came from Mama's kitchen.

I want to remember . . . her total devotion to my daddy that has never wavered in 60 years of marriage.

I want to remember . . . that as a small child she made it clear that church attendance was never optional, that 10% of everything I earned belonged to God, and that putting God first was the only way to live your life.

I want to remember . . . that in spite of my rebellion and stubborn heart, she has always loved me unconditionally, perfectly modeling for me the relationship she has with her heavenly Father year after year.

I want to remember . . . all the ways that she far surpasses me in grace and southern hospitality.

I want to remember . . . all of it, even the hard times. Because much of who my mom is has made me who I am today.

I want to remember . . . everything about her so I remember who I aspire to be.

Blessings,
Renea

Genetics are a funny thing. . .

Sometimes I wonder about God's sense of humor. And just in case you doubt he has one, just ask any parent of a child older than about a year old. Inevitably by that age there has been at least once that the parent has gazed with awe and wonder at said child and thought, 'God's getting me back for. . .' whatever.

Genetics are an amazing web of intricate combinations that are far beyond my comprehension. And sometimes, just sometimes, you find a genetic code that is so strongly stamped onto a person that you just have to look on in amazement.
And if you doubt that last statement, go back and ask the same parent again.

Most of us have at least one thing that we always swore would never happen when we became parents. In my case, one of those sworn to avoid things was my mom's standard answer for any question. "You'll have to ask your daddy." Translation, NO. See, Daddy worked at night for most of my early life. This meant when I got home from school, he had just left for work. And when I got up in the mornings, he was sleeping. So any request for permission had to be planned days in advance, which I never had the forethought to do.

For most moms, a stark reality hits us at the most inopportune moment and when we least expect it. Usually it's about mid sentence into what is about to be a tirade of warnings to a child who has done some dastardly deed or has uttered a forbidden rebellious statement that probably deserves a soapy dinner. And once it happens, you can never un-remember it. It's that moment when you open your mouth and your mother comes out. It just happens. And it's a frightening feeling. You are all at once a child in trouble and the old lady that you thought you'd never be.

But I really intended for this to be about something I did yesterday. I admittedly have the attention span of a flea sometimes. I can sit for hours and work on a project. But if I'm trying to multitask on chores, I walk away to get something and get distracted and forget what I was doing. I'm acutely aware of this brain malfunction. So I try really hard not to do two things at once that could be a problem if you forget to complete one of them. Like ironing. Or frying bacon.

Yesterday I was boiling chicken for soup. It was going to take a while. So I decided to do something else while I waited. I decided to wash a couple things that needed to be hand washed, which meant stopping up the bathroom sink and running water in it. It doesn't take long to fill a sink in a RV. But while I was waiting, I thought I'd take the two steps to the kitchen to check on the chicken. And I got distracted.

For the record, there is no overflow hole in the bathroom sink in our RV.

Now about that genetic code . . .

One of my daughters came in to pick up the grandkid after the water incident. She went to the bathroom. Being well trained by her mother, she wanted to wash her hands. But the bathroom sink was full of everything that was thrown in there off the counter to get it out of the standing water that had overflowed from the sink.

So I told her to wash her hands in the shower. But I forgot the shower floor was covered with wet towels used to sop up the water from the counter and out of the carpet where it spilled over to the floor. There was also a small pillow in there that my hubby had thrown in because the grandkid spilled soup on it.

I, like any resourceful mother, dug out the hand sanitizer in the pile in the sink and just squirted it on her hands and told her to go home and wash her hands.

By this time she was laughing hysterically. Not so much at the situation as at the fact that she tells people all the time that she got it honestly. If ever there was a child that was stamped with her parent's DNA, it's that girl. Bless her heart.

In other news, the chicken noodle soup came out fine.

Blessings,

Renea