Happy Birthday to YOU….Happy Birthday to YOU….Happy Birthday, Dear Flo (mother)..Happy Birthday to YOU!
This lovely lady would have been 91 today. She was one of the hardest working women I know. She loved just as hard as worked.
When I was younger I use to hate her job, she was gone early before it was time for me to go to school and came home long after school was out, only to eat dinner, take a bath, go to bed to do it all over again. I remember begging her to stay home, I needed her home. She couldn’t…..you see, she was a single Mom.
There was a time she worked two jobs, one was to have carfare to get to the one that paid a little more. There was a period I stayed with my grandparents for awhile to go to school and she took a one room efficiency close to the bus stop and her job so she could not only take care of me, but her mother, father and other family members that often needed a bit of help from time to time.
She never thought much of herself; she cared for others more and at the time I did not know why she worked so hard. Had she had only stayed with my Dad, I thought she would not have to work so hard. That had nothing to do with it. If and when there was a need in the family, she was always there trying as hard as she could to fulfill it.
I was sixteen when I began to spend serious time with my Mom. We had moved closer to her job, better living conditions and it didn’t take as much time for her commute. As a matter of fact she got door to door service. One of the guys she worked with lived not very far from us.
In our new surroundings I learned to quilt from her. I use to sew all the time and she would take my scraps and turn them into quilts. From her I learned to cut pieces from the fabric leaving very large useful pieces, something they didn’t teach in school. She use to make pleated skirts without patterns, by hand. She never learned to use an electric sewing machine, she only like the old treadle machines.
I use to love to look at her quilts; to and for me they told a story, a story of my teen years and adulthood until she stopped quilting. We use to go skating; of course, she just liked to watch. For my twenty - first birthday, she bought me a new car, it also included a payment book for my monthly payments and lecture on when I could and could not drive. She could not drive so I became the designated driver in the house. My mother became a best friend once I became an adult, we could talk, share and hangout just about anytime or anywhere, we laughed together; we cried together. From her I learned to carry that love and connection into my relationships with my girls as well as my boys.
There is so much more I could tell you about this woman I call Mom, but then it would be a book. I think about her often, almost daily and I write this with tears in my eyes, but a smile in my heart for having been able to know such a wonderful, kind, loving person. All that met her loved her.
Six years ago, on this day the birth of my grandson happened, so I look at him and hold him close in heart for he was born on the day of his great-grandmother, whom if were alive would spoil him rotten. She died, November 14, 2000; she was old, sick and tired. She had dementia, but she lived a wholesome life while she lived.
Remember to tell everyone close to you at least once a day, even if you’re angry with them, that “I love YOU”, those three little words are heard by my children, grandchildren regularly and I from them.
This is my Happy Birthday Song for my Mom - Flauzella Clark, August 1, 1917 - 2000.
Sherryl
