A lot of folks who have gotten to my stage of life more or less and have lost their mothers are talking on the internet about how many women they view as “mothers”.

First. A lot of people who have known me for a long time remember times when I may have seemed to be at odds with my mother. Guess what? I was. That’s what teenagers do. In the bird world, it might be called fledging. When humans fledge it can be a lot more messy. Or maybe not… All that to say that I DID very much get along with my mom even through those difficult years. They were very difficult for me so I can’t imagine how difficult they were for her. I do know that my mother’s home and moomincabin were ALWAYS safe for me. And fortunately I grew up.

Aunts? I have been BLESSED with aunts. I loved them all, biological aunts and in-laws. The two I remember the best are Radical Betty, who was one of my best friends as well as an aunt and my mom’s sister Charlotte who I didn’t see all that often but she was always fun.

Then there was my mother-in-law, Grandma Sally, who treated me like a daughter even though she had four biological daughters plus a few more daughters-in-law.

Then there was my cousin The Beautiful Jan who had children when I was still a child. She is/was a wonderful mom and I tried to emulate her when I became a mother. As I did with my sister-in-law The Lady of Linden, who birthed five children before I had my first.

And the family friends. Ginny Boult, mom of one of my best childhood friends and wonderful friend of The Commander. Her house was always a safe place, not that I needed one. Barbara Mullin, the woman who taught me to swim (and everybody else on the beach 🤣) and put up with me playing with her children even though I wasn’t always nice to her daughter (ugh). Esther Sherman who came with her husband Pete and their five children and camped in the moomincabin yard and shared our outhouse. She got mad at me one time about tearing a hole in Danny’s handmade (by her) sweater and didn’t hesitate to ream me out. I don’t think Danny cared. He was my boyfriend (we were six). But she was right.

Anyway, it takes a village (as they say) and some of these women were part of my village. And they are totally why I became a successful adult. And I’m sure I’m missing some.

Thank you moms!

This entry was posted on Monday, May 15th, 2023 at 6:56 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.