Century Club

 

Well, Mom turns 100 today. This picture was a couple of years ago. Mom has always referred to me as short, but age has stolen some of her height. I am the shortest and the oldest of the siblings. Mom always likes to wear white to a wedding and this was at my son's wedding reception.  As you can see, I talked her out of pure white. 

We siblings get together to visit with Mom a couple of times a year.  My sister and I visit more often, especially since Mom lives with her now.  The brothers live farther away.  But, we will all be there next weekend to celebrate with her.  Some relatives are coming from Colorado and some from North Carolina. We have planned a picnic in the park.

My feelings about my mom are different from each of my siblings.  Only 5 years separates the youngest from the oldest of the four of us, but we grew up in different families with different parents. Well, they were the exact same parents, but our memories of them are so different.

People say I am like my mom and they are right and they are wrong.  I was Mom's right hand girl.  Even when I was up in my 30s and 40s with a family of my own, there are relatives who referred to me as "Milly's Girl." But, I had my differences.  I have a different personality than Mom.  It is a good thing, because my mom was a force of nature and there could not have been two of us in the family with survival assured for both of us.

Mom was thoroughly modern Milly.  She got a college degree and a career long before it was common for women to do so.  She was born in horse and buggy days. Eventually her family owned a model T Ford.  They didn't have electricity at her house until she graduated from high school.  They (my grandparents) didn't have indoor plumbing until about the time I came along and Mom was long married.  Dad and Mom met at college and married after the War.  They were married five years before I came along.  They had been told that they likely wouldn't have children, so I was a surprise and a miracle.

As I mentioned, each of my siblings have different feelings about our parents and how we were raised. Mom certainly was a role model for drive and determination.  I refer to her past tense, not because she isn't here, because she is still alive and kicking and knows us and can tell a story or two or ten. But, she has softened.  Time has taken away the edge, smoothed the rough parts.  She has become a very sweet, serene old woman.  She seems largely at peace with things.  That is a blessing.