|
|
As a child, I was fortunate to grow up encircled by three women; not to say my family was absent a devoted father or doting grandfathers, just to acknowledge, given the arrival of Mother’s Day, the significance these three gentle matriarch’s played in sculpting my life.
On my mother’s side there was Alma. A petite, yet surprisingly plucky woman of Scandinavian descent. Alma grew up on Simon Lake Farm, located on the outskirts of Benson, an unpretentious little community in Swift County, Minnesota, bordered to the west by a tributary of the Minnesota River. It makes perfect sense that Alma would grow up in a town named for a Norwegian settler.
Simon Lake Farm boasted a barn that held claim to the biggest barn in the State of Minnesota. I spent many an hour on the rope swing that swung from rafter to rafter.
While not everyone who sailed from the Scandinavian Peninsula was considered a gentle soul with a gargantuan heart, my diminutive grandmother certainly fit this narrative. I can still picture her hands entangled in her apron, a tonal layering of pale blues, and her endearing glance bristling with antics. Alma, as the meaning of her name suggests, “lifted your spirit.»
On my father’s side was Minerva; however, everyone knew her as “Minne.” Minne was unmistakably of Scotch/Irish descent and appeared to bask in it. Like Alma, Minne was a very large-hearted person. A devout, strong woman of faith, Minne earnestly read her Bible and was never content with a sentimental piety. Instead, Minne sought, with tremendous sincerity, to place spiritual mindedness solidly on a foundation of knowledge and prayerful reflective thought.
Many a night, grandma would sit down on the edge of the bed mattress and unspool one of her Sunday School lessons before I would end the night reciting a Scripture verse for each letter in the alphabet …the Zzzs often came quickly.
It wouldn’t be until years after she had left us that I would learn the meaning of her name Minerva: “Goddess of Wisdom.”
Both my dear grandmothers’ saintly solemnity was qualified by their winsome wit and commonplace humor.
Harriet Beecher Stowe, one of the most influential women of the 19th century, believed “Most mothers are instinctive philosophers [deep thinkers].”
I can picture their pensive pose steeped over a cup of hot coffee at first light.
There was a sweetness to Mother’s Day in my youth. It wasn’t crowded out by “other things.” Dad made sure of that. It was a day set aside. My older and younger brother would put on our Sunday best—bow tie with smartly pressed white collar. Dad would place a potted flower in each of our hands to give to Mom before we set off to church and a special dinner out afterward.
Looking back at the photos and the “momentin time” expressions on our faces, it is evident we were proud sons, eager to honor our Mother.
At such a young age, full appreciation for the breadth and depth of love—the natural state of unselfishness— encompassed in a mother’s heart, falls short, way short. It isn’t until years later, should we be blessed with our own children, that we come to put such devotion and unsparingness in context. I have grown to appreciate that the influence of a mother in the lives of her children is beyond computation.
And, on this Mother’s Day, to the mother of my children:
You are a good woman . . .
My life has been richer these many years because you have been in it.
The excitement, anticipation, hopes and dreams imagined through youthful eyes . . .
Beginnings . . . beginnings that find their definition in the years as they unfold.
I never could have imagined then, what it means to “have and to hold.”
And, although our embrace has widened, to include the blessing of children and grandchildren, know that I still singularly reflect on that day that I embraced you.
Biblical King Solomon, with his God-given “wise and understanding heart,” penned in the book of Proverbs, “Charm can be deceiving, and beauty fades away, but a woman who honors the Lord deserves to be praised.”
Leave a Reply