My Mama

There is always a little mystery that surrounds our parents. Were they ever actually my age? I don’t think so, but then we know that they must have been at some point. That world is far away. We see snapshots of our folks in their younger years with other people they have lost touch with, living stories before we were part of them. And they sport hairstyles and clothes long since out of fashion. 

My Mama looks pretty much the same these days. Her hair is a little grayer, but that I think is to be expected. Maybe a few wrinkles. I know this because I’ve got those same wrinkles showing up in the same places. She is a woman of small stature with dark hair she usually wears braided or pulled back off her face in a bun. When she goes to town she wears it down, and often tucked off her face with two combs. She has a cheery, charismatic smile and has never been the fancied-up type. I can picture her exactly now. Actually, if you are reading this in the early morning or later evening hours, she is probably sitting there right now, in her vintage arm chair with the floral upholstery and wide wooden arms. A cup of tea on the arm where it's easy to grab, a book and a spiral bound notebook in her lap. She planning this year's garden, or jotting down some of her thoughts. Maybe she is taking a few notes on something else she is planning to do. Mama is a planner - the maker of lists and notes before she jumps headlong into things. Not at all like me who jumps first and asks questions later, when I am in way too deep to step back and reevaluate. 

My Mama is happy in her own skin. Something I’m glad she taught me by example. Neither of us are perfect, no one truly is, we both are content to meet ourselves where we are at. Once I saw a photograph of Ma Ingalls, and I was surprised that she wasn’t the spitting image of my own Mama. I always imagined Caroline would look just like her. They always seemed to have the same nurturing nature and ability to handle anything that came their way with grace and a cool, calculated, collectedness that was somehow warm and reassuring at the same time. Both getting a cup of hot tea for Pa when he comes from chores on a cold winter's evening, and tucking us in at night.

Always a stay at home mom, Mama created the magic of my childhood. She cared for me tirelessly in the early years when Pa put in long hours at work and doing evening farrier work after that. She corrected my homework, packed our lunches, helped at school (her cursive looks like it came out of a penmanship book, thanks to the Catholic nuns that taught her). She was the sewer of many nightgowns, holiday dresses, reenacting clothes for the whole family, and still sews most of Pa’s shirts. She manages our modest farmstead, our family gardens, and preserves the fruits of that labor. Mama butchers chickens, manages the family’s finances, and  coordinates a buying club where we purchase the food we cannot grow ourselves. On top of all that she could always somehow manage to create a feast from a wholesome variety of ingredients we kept in the house. She feeds everyone who comes through the door, including anyone Pa brings in for dinner... which is pretty much everyone who happens to be on the premises at mealtime.  It is expected that you at least join us for a cup of tea. We’ve created hordes of people who never knew they liked tea, but now drop by in hopes of having a cup.

When people ask Mama what she does, she usually fumbles a little. She can’t give you a list of educational credentials or places she’s been. There is no PHD in just making it all happen, but my Mama is the heartbeat of our family and the fire at the center of our lodge. She is the rhythm that keeps our farmstead turning as it should.

Mamas are given to us to teach us how to stumble less through our own lives. They fill our emotional and educational "tool box" with all the tools we need to survive life in the big and crazy world outside the shelter of our families. Here's how my Mama did this.

10 Things My Mama Taught Me That Totally Rock

1.) Learning to be on your own is a great skill.

 I am an only child. For me this hasn’t been a great event of getting everything I ever wanted and not ever having to share anything. It’s just a fact of my life. For example - I spent years pining over a real American Girl Doll. The girl across the street had three, and by the time Kirsten arrived at my birthday party I was almost too old for her. But I cherished her so much more than if I would have been given her right out of the starting gate. Gifts like that are supposed to earned and cherished. 

 I played on my own as a kid - in the barn, in the creek, in the woods. And when I reached school age I shared all these adventures with neighborhood kids and school friends. There was one summer I had a friend over every single day. When one day that didn’t work out, Mama told me it was good to go back to being on my own for a bit. In a way, having someone there all the time was spoiling me. Over the years there have been many times I found myself on my own for various reasons and I have always been fine. I spent a lot of time alone when I was in college. As a commuter, I never had “college friends.” I didn’t know anyone in class. I had countless projects that were supposed to be done as a group that I wound up doing by myself. In the work place, I’ve done a lot of work on my own as well. It has never bothered me. Even as the crazy extrovert that I am, I am still very much ok by myself. I am now married to a wonderful man who works long hours both on and off the farm just like my Pa did in the early years, and I am ok. Mama is right. Learning to be on your own a good skill to have in my tool box. 

2.) “Bored” is a swear word.

 When I had friends over to my televisionless house, the word “bored” usually popped out of their mouths at some point, and my family would all recoil in horror. Its just not something that was said in our house. There are books, games, crafts, the creek, the woods, all the animals, let the list ramble on! How can you possibly use that word!? There is absolutely no reason to. And if, by chance, you find yourself at a loss - Mama will make a suggestion of her own choosing. Let’s just say that I kept myself very busy.

3.) How to eat a chicken for a week.

 Mama calls this a note from her “Frugal Kitchen”. Though she wasn’t even a glimmer in her own Mama’s eye yet during the Great Depression or the rationing years of the World Wars, she would have navigated those years with the ease of an experienced general. Not much goes to waste in her farm kitchen. Meals are recycled into new ones, and little scraps of things are drawn out into delicious soups, casseroles, and much more.  Mama makes a Sunday roast chicken, then she takes off the excess meat from the bones. She might make fajitas, or a stir fry or something like that with the scraps. On a third or fourth day she boils what is left of the carcass to make a good broth. Maybe the fat can even be skimmed from the top to make biscuits (No "Chicken in a biskit" crackers here - we actually put chicken in biscuits). The broth, little chicken schnibbles, a variety of hearty vegetables from the cellar, and maybe some homemade noodles (my favorite version). Wala! There is a delicious and nourishing soup we eat for a day to two. Look at that! Somehow it got to be Saturday and we have been eating the same chicken made 5 different ways! As for the chicken, if he was a mean rooster who went after us at chore time, this is all the more savory of an event. If he was just the unlucky pick of the flock, then his life was not lived for naught. 

4.) Mama never adjusted her life to accommodate my delicate needs.

 This might sound awful at first, but honestly it is one of the very best things I think she did for me. I tagged along to everything as a kid. I was at my first funeral at around 2 weeks old, I went to a wedding at a similar age too. I also saw a movie somewhere in there too. I went to concerts, auctions, tractor shows, reenactments, homemakers meetings, reunions, historical society meetings, parties, you name it. I was there and I was expected to behave myself. Rarely was I set up with a babysitter. I never had “play dates” like so many parents are doing for their kids these days. If there were kids where Mama went, it was a fringe benefit. Not many of my parent’s friends had kids at the same time as they did either.

 All these little outings were a pretty big deal when I step back and look. It taught me that the world does not revolve around me, and while me needs are important, so are everyone else’s.  It also taught me to converse with adults and all sorts of different people. By going all these places, I met and interacted with so many different people from all walks of life that it really opened up the world for me. Even though I am not a world traveler, I have met people from so many different places and of different ages, it is almost as if I don’t need to be a world traveler to travel the world. They bring it all to me. I would have missed all this wonderful stuff if I was at home with a babysitter. Plus I doubt I will become a world traveler as much as I’d like to see some other places. One cannot simultaneously be a farmer and a world traveler, the two are simply not easily compatible. My experiences and interactions on the heels of Mama gave me the best of both worlds.

5.) If “ifs” and “ands” were pots and pans, there’d be no need for tinkers.

 Variations of this phrase was first written down in the mid-nineteenth century it seems, though I am sure it is much older. It is a gentle and optimistic reminder of how important it is to live in the present. If I were face down on my bed droning on about all thing things I could have done differently, “If only blah, blah, blah, and yada yada yada…” Mama sighs and tells me this old phrase. My paternal Grandma also uses it often. Now I find myself using it with my daughter. She stares at me blankly asking what a tinker is. The phrase now serves two purposes. A life lesson on wishful thinking, and history lesson on the trades.

6.) Let me struggle.

 Mama watched me trace out my body on top of a piece of fabric, cut it out, sew it up and wonder why it didn’t fit me. When I was flustered over why it didn’t work, she showed me why. Mama would let me struggle at first in part because A.) I never asked for help and B.) I wouldn’t listen anyway. Either way, I can now draft up a pretty sweet sewing pattern and am not half bad at draping either, despite that I have absolutely no formal training whatsoever. Lessons learned from determination and mistakes are better learned. Mama lent a few tools to the school of hard knocks.

7.) If you can make a white sauce, you can cook anything!

 This is definitely so true, and it plays a large role in Mama’s culinary genius. The first food I learned to cook was her homemade Mac and Cheese. It starts with a white sauce base. This same base is in soooo many recipes. I now use it in broccoli cheese soup, scalloped potatoes, stroganoff, and now my own version of tater tot casserole. Anything that has cream of mushroom soup in it can be faked with a white sauce, and is often way better! Find the Recipe Here!

8.) Write it down.

 Be like Mama. Put up long and short-term to-do lists on the refrigerator. Write letters to friends, and keep a short log of what goes on from year to year, day to day. It’s the best way to get out those big, big feelings. Whenever I am mad or sad, just overcome with crazy emotions of any kind, or just can’t seem to get myself straightened out, I write it down. I make lists, I write letters and somehow it becomes a lot clearer, and I am calmer.  Journaling, letters, and making lists are how I muddle though the day to day. 

9.) You do what you can with the shit on hand.

 Both Mama and Pa are dedicated to this notion, so I suppose I shouldn’t attribute it to Mama entirely. However, whenever things aren’t panning out the way I planned, or I really want something and don’t have exactly what I need to make it happen, this is a usual response. It is the anthem of making-do. Not settling exactly, but building an empire out of a stack of stones and a pile of discarded tools and lumber. It means opening the fridge and taking out everything that should be eaten before it goes bad and making a delicious meal from it. It means creating a winning hand from the cards you’ve been dealt. 

10.) Dance on the tables.

 Mama loves music. At weddings she’s usually the first one to get out there and hit the dance floor. Once she even convinced my older cousins to dance on the tables. The owner of the establishment was not impressed, but the rest of us are pretty fond of the memory. Mama always has the radio on. Sometimes she cranks up her favorite song loud enough the windows in the house rattle and the dog asks to be let out. See U2 - Rattle and Hum. We jam out. “Dance like no one is watching” isn’t just a phrase on a cheesy sign, it is an essential movement that feeds the soul. Dance on any furniture - tables not required.

Quarantine notes -

 Even though I have been juggling the idea of this writing around in my head for a while, now seemed like a good time to start. This post, more than the others, I think reflects how Mama and, by default, the farmstead has instilled in me self sufficiency and prepared me for a lifetime of whatever might be thrown at me. The social distancing, sheltering at home, and all the changes that come along with COVID-19 have been hard for everyone, myself included. However, every single one of these 10 items have been incredibly helpful to have in my toolbox for working through not only these changing times, but life in general. I find myself on my own, just me and the kids, for majority of the day. I find myself telling my daughter that “bored” is a swearword. I find myself rummaging through the fridge and the cupboard and "doing what I can with the shit on hand" so I can go to the grocery store as little as feasibly possible. I am writing letters to friends that I haven’t written to in ages, if ever, and it feels good. Such a relaxing and releasing experience. I don’t need the cream of mushroom soup that most stores are out of anyways, because I can make a white sauce. I am doing projects around the house with meager supplies, and I dance around my house with my kids because it feeds our souls. We have 9 foot ceilings here, plenty high enough to dance on table tops. Thanks Mama for the tools.