Tomorrow is seven-years since my mother passed away, and in
her honor, I’m going to tackle things with some light humor and take you on a
short journey through my life with her special quotes. In fact, we’ve all heard
them. Most of us have even spoken them.
Mommyisms.
Those things your
mother said that most likely weren’t even true, but when she said it, her voice
rang with the authenticity that only a mother can procure. Right?
Like, “If you eat a seed,
a tree will grow in your tummy.” Or “There’s enough dirt in those ears to grow
potatoes.” And the dreaded “If you tell me one more ‘story’ Sydney Lea, your
nose is going to grow like a carrot.”
I’m not kidding when I
tell you that as a very small child, I was constantly looking in the mirror to
see if there were any signs of vegetables growing out my ears!
You all know how much I
love and miss my mother. So, I thought it would be fun to shed some light on a
few of my mother’s quotes that may explain why I am who I am today. I’m sure
you’ve heard them or at least some version of these “mommyisms”.
We’ll start with this: My mother absolutely hated to hear my younger sister and me whine, and we weren't allowed to mope. In fact, forget about crying, too.
Whatever the circumstances, we were expected to "dry it up."
"Pick up your lip or someone's going to step on it."
“Quit your bellyaching!”
"Stop crying, or I'll give you something to cry about!"
Naturally we didn't want that last one to happen, because that would mean getting hit on the behind with the dirty fly swatter.
And who wants that to happen? Yuck! Trust me, that fly swatter served a duel purpose. Growing up in Miami without air-conditioning meant the windows were always open.
Mother wasn’t the kind of person to use the “I’m going to give you until the count of three” line, nor the “Just wait until your father gets home” line. My mother handled things. Period.
When I wanted something she wouldn’t let me have, or I wanted to do something that she wouldn’t give me permission to do, I’d fold my arms in front of me and pout. I often heard, "You can get glad in the same pants you got mad in, young lady."
My mom’s "The world doesn't owe you a thing" taught me that the sooner I take responsibility for my actions, the better off I'd be.
Do you remember after getting in trouble for doing something you knew you shouldn’t have been doing, saying to your mother, “Well, everyone else was doing it” ??
And her response would be, "If your friends jumped off the bridge, would you?"
Of course, when my mother would ask me that question, I wanted to ask her, “That depends, Mom. Who else is going?” and “What are they wearing?"
Ha ha ha
But a level head prevailed, which kept me from actually being pushed off that bridge.
Mother also said, "There's no sense in crying over spilled milk." That's a lesson that, to this day, I still haven’t learned. I've just never been able to turn my emotions off and on like a water faucet – ‘though I sure wish I could.
Another memory I have is when I wanted to have my ears pierced. Mom said, "If God had wanted you to have holes in your ears, he would have put them there himself." So, every time I asked her if I could get my ears pierced, she said “No.”
If you know me, then you know my ears are pierced, and I didn’t wait until I was an adult to do it. Being a do-it-yourself kind of gal (learned through Girl Scouting with my mom as my leader for many years), and although I was only 13-years old, I simply got some ice, froze my earlobes one at a time and poked a sewing needle and thread right through them. I was petrified when I couldn't get one of my ears to stop bleeding -- but that "don't cry over spilled milk" thing sure came in handy at the time.
Here’s the thing, though: From my earliest memories, I knew that the same woman who tanned my hide with that disgustingly dirty fly swatter also had my back. Always!
She was proud of every one of my accomplishments; from learning how to play the flutophone in elementary school to becoming the editor of a social magazine and everything in-between. She was also proud of me during failures.
Mother played a huge role in why I was always able to get so much done in so little time. When I’d tell her my plans, she’d always reply, “You’re going to do wonders and eat green cucumbers.” (That happens to be my favorite Julia mommyism.) She had incredible faith in me; that I’d accomplish whatever I set out to do.
Mom also taught me that "Into every life a little rain must fall, but if you have a good umbrella and a tube of red lipstick, you can get through anything." That's a life lesson that I hope I've passed on to my son (except maybe for the red lipstick part). (And now you know why my lips are always red.)
She taught me by example just how important it is for my own son to know there is always someone there rooting for him; someone who loves him unconditionally.
For her birthday in 2011, I gave her a book about the kind of love that was shared by the two of us. In it was a quote that quickly became one of her favorites:
“But if I will love, then I will find I have touched another life, and that’s something. Something worth leaving behind.”
Not long after my mother passed away, I bought a small sign I saw in the window of a gift shop.
It says, “Mirror mirror on the wall, I am my mother afterall.”
Big shoes to fill. I want so much for that to be true, because she was the BEST and there are far worse things than being like her. Right?
