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Remembering
Mother
Sandra Hartle
02/02/2003
Last week I wrote a
commentary regarding the peace marches
in Washington DC, in the piece I commented on how smart my mother was,
and how at the time she was giving me her advice I often did not
heed it much, and at times it made me angry. This I
discovered later, when I had children in their teens is a pretty
standard reaction to Mother's Advice.
She has been in my
thoughts a lot lately, at 83 years old I was wondering how she was
doing, yet I did not pick up the phone to find out. I knew
she was with my oldest brother, in Denver, but I just kept putting it
off. On Monday January 27, 2003 Mother passed away.
I suspect this is why she was so heavy in my thoughts for the past few
months.
I only remember bits and
pieces of my early childhood. But one thing that is always there
is how very beautiful my mother was. When I was very
young and my father had just been released from the military right
after World War II we lived in a housing project that was built for
the purpose of housing veterans. I remember living there, for
several years. Both of my brothers were born while we
lived in the project.
I remember mom spanking me
once for trying to hide a fire we had set in a trailer, with the
fluffy dress she always had me in as a small child. She never
allowed me wear pants, and every morning she either braided my long
hair in French braids or worked to wrap its unruly curls into tight
long curls that she pinned back with a barrette.
I remember my brother
John, setting fire to the living room rug while mom was outside one
day, I am not sure I remember much other than that and the resulting
burn. I remember when my youngest brother Jim was born, and how
at about 3 months he nearly choked to death on a marble. I
had heard him gagging and went and got my parents in time to help
him.
I remember the baby
sitter, Carol Kegel who also lived in the project who was seven years
older than me, and like an older sister throughout my life.
I remember when I was in
the fourth grade, mom was called to the school because I was in really
bad pain, my appendix was about to erupt. The ride to the
doctors and the hospital scared me more than the pain, because I was
afraid she was going to get into a wreck in the car. She blasted
the horn all the way to down town Seattle, where apparently the
nearest hospital was located at the time.
I thought I was the
luckiest girl in the fourth grade because my mother was involved in
PTA, and on my birthday she always brought cup cakes to school.
She was so pretty, and at the time her hair, when it was down, would hit
the back of her knees. She had beautiful dark brown hair.
I was in the fourth grade
when she finally decided to cut off all my long curls, because I
raised such a fuss when she would comb my hair. When I came home from
school, I would often come in to the smell of fresh baked Danish or
Cookies, or homemade jam.
When I was in the sixth
grade mom, and dad let me have a horse. The horse was wonderful
and I rode it whenever I could. I often walked the 5
miles to where she was kept early in the mornings on Saturday so I
could ride. When I was late getting back to the house, my father
would ride the horse back to the barn for me.
She worked furiously in
her gardens, and the fruit of her work was a wonderful back yard, where
you could enjoy your privacy. She sewed, and when my daughter
was little, I remember her spending hours crocheting or knitting
Barbie dresses for her dolls. She was a devoted Grandmother, who
loved small children immensely.
By the time I was in the
9th grade things started changing between mom and me. I have
never known why. But to this day, the above is the mother I
remember. These days when I look in the mirror, I see my mother,
looking back at me, and when I watch my daughter with her four
children, I see the young mother that I remember.
I seriously regret not
picking up the phone.
In Memory of Sylva Hartle
Mother, Grandmother and
Great Grandmother
Sandra Hartle
Email: sandrahartle@juntosociety.com
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