Birthday Cake

Birthday Cake

Today my mom turns the big six zero! 60 years old everybody! She is refusing celebration amidst the Covid pandemic, but my siblings and I are still going to ensure she get the seafood platter of dreams. Only she can reflect on the full 60 years, but I can reflect on the 34 years of being her daughter. BTW isn’t the profile of her simply modelesque in this photo? I love the Life touch nod, I’ve never been able to master it. When I took a psychology class at UMF, they taught us that your attachment to the mother figure in your life essentially guarantees either a lifetime of happiness or a lifetime in the clink. Sure, environment, resources and grit play a role, but it appears like that maternal bond is really pretty layered when it comes to lifetime achievement awards. What are your earliest memories of your Mom? Mine include listening to Make Way for Ducklings, trips to the Gardiner Library, steamed clams on the coast, tractor rides on her lap, bumping through the apple orchard. One aspect I think she should be super proud of is, I could hardly ever feel her stress or her bad days. If she was struggling with working or not, her marriage, her identity, her hair color. I never felt the weight of any of it. Now that is a pretty big revelation for having four kids in the house. I remember her loading us all into her suburban and strapping me into one of those booster seats, which now wouldn’t field a safety test for an American Girl doll , but those were the days of freedom, when kids piled into the back of the truck and ping ponged back and forth before they were allowed entry inside the vehicle, where they were then exposed to plenty of second hand smoke and sugar free Kool aid. Sometimes I wonder what it’s like to NOT be raised by a nurse, because when it was my time to go into kindergarten, I walked onto the school bus, chatting happily to my seat mate and when he asked me what all the bumps on my legs were for, I promptly told him, some were leftover marks from Chickenpox and the rest were eczema bumps, which by the way, is in no way contagious and just genetic. The poor sap sitting next to me, simply nodded, hugging his Ninja the Turtle backpack closer to his chest and wondering what the f was wrong with me. Prior to the time of parental divorce, I remember my Mom doing a lot of long walks and a lot of listening to Randy Travis. I think the two combined, allowed her to see her unhappiness, combined with growing apart from my father were leading her toward a divorce. At that time divorce, was a little bit of a black mark on a squeaky clean record, but it was certainly needed and my parents were both happier and better parents as a result. My Mom was super heavy on showing me how to be as independent as possible and I knew how to load a washing machine and the liquid albuterol that went into my nebulizer machine.

Some of my favorite memories of her include her attempting to discipline my older sister, amidst a knock on the door, whereupon she was greeted by a lovely frizzy haired lady offering to sell her bibles. My mother politely declined the bibles, while still mopping the floor to the tune of Michael Bolton and drowning out the screams from us fighting in the backyard. The bible selling gal then asked my mom if she even cared about her daughters relationship to Jesus. She said this while pointing to my wild eyed/haired older sister who was using crayons like a tatoo artist on the wall paper on the kitchen. Not today! My mom told her, slamming the door in her face and finishing her Bolton/mopping time. It is my favorite, did I stutter moment. Another time we were waiting in traffic on the Gardiner/ Randolph bridge and someone rammed into her from behind, a few days after she had just bought a new vehicle from Charlies. It turned out the offender was blitzed out of his mind and when he stumbled out of his car and offered my sister and I a Fanta Grape Soda, my mom proceeded to tell him, no amount of soda was going to fix her vehicle. Directly after, we were waiting at Charlie’s , where they were refusing to give her a rental vehicle that would fit ALL of her four children (because I guess insurance only pays for rentals for mothers who have a Leave it to Beaver Family) and she went up to the front desk and said I will wait to speak to the manager. But, Mam, the manager has gone home for the day. Would she like a complimentary bottle of water instead? Umm, no girl, she means the manager as in owner, as in Charlie, and yes she will wait. Ahhh deliciousness, do you see all the life lessons I was learning through these dumpster days of being smashed into on the bridge and hit over the head by a bible? Welcome to the witty, persistent, still working on not taking no for answer gal you are witness to today.

As I grew older, she championed me in all the best ways, paying for gymnastic classes even if I was never going to be an Olympian, buying me six books in the puberty section at Barnes and Noble so that I could read myself into all the magic of becoming a woman, sitting through every sweltering swim meet in high school, even if she was the only one there. Sure we went through that mother daughter time , I’m sure everyone does, where I slammed a lot of doors and called her names and she sat outside on the porch and wondered why teenagers are so rotten. As my own daughter gets ready to enter the teenage years, I just I hope I am ready to deal with her ways of assholery like my Mom did. When I was in college we started getting closer, toward a friendship vibe and even began doing some running and some races together. If you still have the time or haven’t finished your coffee yet, I will outline one of the scariest days of my life, up until now and that is the day of her heart attack. I received a text from my step dad that she was having trouble getting her heart to slow down the night before and had ultimately called for the ambulance. After sitting bolt upright in bed, I got another text that said, your mom wants all of you at the hospital stat. I called my older sister, who has basically been my Kimmy Gibler since birth and we loaded into her car, frantically texting and calling my brother. He texted asking if he needed to come, as all males do in every family and I texted back would you get your f’ing pants on and get in the car. My brother then drove his two irrational sisters up to the emergency room and we raced through the entrance doors in what felt like slow motion. Seeing her there in a Johnny, drugged up and fairly unresponsive is one of the scariest moments of my life. At the same time, seeing the doctor who had just used the crash cart on her, exit her room, take a deep breath and look like he either needs to haul off a diet coke or vomit in the bathroom is also a sight to behold. She told me later on that she grabbed the doctor, by his collar and told him that he better not mess this up, right before he used the paddles on her. Isn’t she an absolute bad ass? I hope I have half of that in me when I need to use it. On this day, her 60th birthday, I thank that doctor, the technology of the paddles, the rush of the ambulance, God, Mary, Jesus and Moses for keeping her on this green Earth to still guide me through this roller coaster of a ride. I can’t imagine her without it. Not only did her and I just run seven miles together a few days ago, but she is the reason for all my maternal guard points, all my instinctual Momma vibes I get when something just doesn’t feel right. She is my go-to for all and any rants and ravings after a bad day, my inclination toward a stubborn attitude and a strong work ethic, not to mention she shows so much love to her grand babies and 100% of the time more patience. I would love to shower her with a big ol’ cruise, or a trip to someplace that doesn’t snow in the god damn month of May, but despite that, we are still here, her in that teal green sweatshirt holding me on that tractor ride at Baileys Orchard and me holding her hand as she came back into consciousness from her heart episode. This same universe that is sending out murder hornets and virus transmission through coughing, straws and even as I learned on Sunday when reading an article semen, is the same universe that provided me with this powerhouse of a human. Covid birthday or not, it is still another year, that I get to show my gratefulness that she was the person who held me on day one and not one of those scary Carole Baskin types. Motherhood matters, like a lot, and I hope I can do half a good as job as she. Happy 60 years to one of THE best.

One thought on “Birthday Cake

  1. Thank you so much for your kind words my dear Taryn Ann…. I am the one who is blessed. Of all the accomplishments (I even worked with our now famous Dr. Shah at the Maine CDC) in my life, being a mother is the one that I will forever be most proud of. I truly believe the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world (and yes that is a line to a country song). If you can positively impact a child, you truly can change the world. Again, my dear …. I am the one who is blessed. Love you , Mom

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