Things about my Mom

Since Mom died, I've been doing a lot of thinking about my experiences with her as a younger kid. As a 45 year old adult there's a lot of disconnects between various points in time, but I thought maybe writing some of them down might trigger a few thoughts here and there. Some of these fall into the category of family legend or just stories I have told over and over again (so they may be part fact part fiction).
- Mom used to let me hang out in her room while she was getting dressed for parties. She and Dad must have gone out quite a bit since I have many memories of this. She'd walk around in her bra and stockings while she put on makeup and did her hair. Her dresser drawers, the top ones, had all her jewelry in them (they did right up until she died) and she'd carefully pick out what she wanted to go with what she was wearing. Her face powder had a really nice smell to it and I think she used the same powder for a long time, because it's still a smell I associate with fancy dress up parties. No idea where my Dad was at this point, probably already dressed and downstairs.
- Probably when I was younger than when I was watching her get dressed, like little-kid young, she used to make fun of how her hair looked just washed from the shower before she brushed it, kind of shaking her head and saying "Witch!" Somehow I associate this memory with the laundry room or utility room of our house in Japan even though I think that's because she actually dressed up as a witch for Halloween one year and we were in the utility room for some reason.
- I remember sitting on the brown sofa in our old kitchen/family room in New Canaan after school crying about getting teased on the school bus by the older kids and Mom giving me hugs and trying to make me feel better. I don't really remember what she said.
- Shopping for my first bra in the downstairs section of some store in New Canaan, when young girls' bras came in the funny colored boxes and all of them were white and kind of padded.
- Cooking with Mom in her "square" in New Canaan, making apple pie (although she didn't make it much). I also remember the deep fryer she had for making fried chicken (plugged into the wall) and the pancake griddle. Somewhere along the way she let me make a meal for the family and for some reason I wanted to make scallops. I think they were OK, actually.
- Hiking up Mount Washington with Annika Freyss and Mom and Dad. I don't remember if Coulter was there or not. I remember there were mice in the cabin late at night and Annika was freaked out about them. Mom was a total trooper even though I remember she got pretty tired near the top of Tuckerman's ravine. It's pretty cool that she and dad would have done that for me, it's not an easy hike and I have no idea where they got the camping equipment.
- Of course there's the story about my being on a plane as a little kid and telling Mom that I wanted to be a stewardess (that was the term back then) when I grew up, and having her tell me "No, sweetie, you want to be a pilot." I am sure she said something different, but that's what it's turned into over many retellings.
- Sharon Collins would of course remember the famous "you're playing with fire" lecture when we were doodling on Rick and Ken(?)'s jeans one night at our house. I'm sure she thought we were a little less sophisticated than we were about boys at the time, as I recall we knew exactly what we were doing.

I feel like there's so much family history missing from these recollections!

I miss you, Mom.

Thoughts on Motherhood

Well, it's been over a year since I posted on this blog. I had originally intended to post monthly at least, but have really petered out over time. It's not that I don't have things to say about Kaia anymore, in fact she is changing and growing more quickly now than she ever did, really. It's just that when I do think about it and look back to previous posts it seems like the changes are so vast that I need to make them awfully generic to fit into a several paragraph post. She's gotten so mature! And so funny! And big! It doesn't really convey the truth of the person she is.

I had thought that maybe I'd also use this blog to capture some thoughts about Mimi as well, and maybe even thoughts on me, for whatever that's worth. It's not like other folks ever read this so I figure it's enough like a private journal that I could assume that it's only for me to read and come back to. I'd like to think that if I did do that I'd see the same kind of growth and evolution in myself over time that I see in Kaia. It's far less obvious, of course.

One of the things that is bothering me about Mom's death is that as I think about the stories I used to tell about her, to others or to myself, I find myself questioning how much of the stories are apocryphal and how much are really true. One thing I recall is her telling me how important it was for me to get good grades and use my brain ("God given" may have been used as an adjective) because I was never going to make a living on my looks. Now, I don't think I ever fantasized about becoming a Ford model even when that girl Heather that I knew was doing just that - I didn't ever think I was that pretty. But I think that comment, or similar ones, stuck deep. If I try to put myself into Jason's shoes I don't ever "see" me as beautiful, and I can't picture him looking at me and feeling pleased with what he sees. I know, beauty is only skin deep, but I am acutely aware all the time of how we look at Boo and say she is beautiful and I always make the comment that she got her father's looks. My friends always take me to task about that, since it of course implies that she didn't get mine, what a relief. Dad's looks and my brains and business savvy, ha ha. She is beautiful. But I think that some of it she got from me.