My mother was quite young when I,The Great One, the first born graced the face of the planet. Born to teenage parents in the 1979, it would seem that perhaps my fate was doomed from the start. Enter point 1 of extraordinary mothering! LOL she stayed with my paternal grandparents until I was 4! FOUR! can you frigging imagine raising your child (when you are but a child yourself) with your in-laws?! I feel suicidal at the mere thought!! She is like Mother Mary herself!
Soon we were solo, me and Pugsley, my Mom and my biological dad. Moving just up the hill into a 3 bedroom house constructed by my Papa and father. I spent the first year trying to sneak back "home" to my grandparents, which according to them is where I belonged. It must have been hard for my mom, to listen to me cry and beg to be somewhere other than with her, but she endured and made me stay in my new home!
My father was often gone working or drinking or sometimes a great combo of both, isn't that just magical!! I blame my love of tequila on him! Mom was in charge of a herd of foolish goats, pigs, chickens, sheep and a stream of ridiculous animals we begged to have, four small kids and no money! She did chores for the neighbouring farms to make money or to trade for supplies like eggs and milk. (I would be telling my drunk of a husband to wise up, with a firm boot to the babymaker) OH! and was often roped into helping her in-laws on various life or death situations, because you know she was young and quick!
"Just squirrel up there" my Papa would say, pointing to the top of the barn loft, as the roof is crumbling and the bats are moving in " you'll be fine, your young and bouncy" ..... or "Jump into the boar pen ok, and grab that piglet, I'll distract the boar over here, just hop the fence if it looks dicey" my fav! "Get in the tractor bucket and I'll lift you in the air (30 or so feet) to tie that ok?" JESUS! I woulda told that old fool to get stuffed!!
How we had everything we ever needed still amazes me, this woman can stretch a dollar like no other!! We were never hungry, sick of eating rice and wild meat, but never truly hungry and we always had apples and oranges. We always had clothes and decent shoes and love! We always had love. I think back on the times I ate my homemade jam and bread sandwich at school longing for the thin slices of wonderbread and the jam from a jar like my friends. Or all the times I traded my homemade cookies for oreos and listen to my classmates say how they wish their mom's would make them cookies. I remember thinking I wish my mom would buy cookies and bread instead of making them. As a grown up, I think about everything I do in a day, and then try to fit in making bread and cookies for my kids.... can't do it, there's a trade off - clean house and an on time supper or cookies?? Forget baking bread during the week, cuz that's just crazy talk!
Mom is the mother that went without so we could have something.... no cigarettes so we could have lunch money, or no coffee so we could have the treat at the store. She would scrimp and save so my sisters and I could have the "good" shampoo and conditioner, and the expensive deodorant. Those small things I will remember forever. She would fight with our father so we could go on field trips, sport events and sleepovers. I never saw my mom buy herself something new until I was grown and had a kid of my own, and even then she was concerned that it was over $20! Seriously!
She always had and still does have time for us, each of us. All four "big" kids, and then my mini me (my baby sister) and all the grandkids we have blessed her with.We never felt left out or that she loved one of us or than the other. She always has time to listen to us, or our children or our friends. And she sees the difference in us as well, where I need a firm hand ;) and my #4 needed a softer approach, my #5 needed to run wild and free and Pugsley needed to stand and be a man. She taught us to be kind, and compassionate, and to share what we had, even if what we had was nothing. She showed us that things aren't always crap, and sometimes you need to make your own happy ending. She made us all to be independent and strong.To have a voice, and make yourself be heard. She showed us that if you make a mistake, have enough pride in yourself to say you screwed up and take the aftermath like an adult. She taught us how to be good role models and good parents.
We didn't have the cleanest house in Canada, but when you have sneaky baby goats, a shetland pony that can open doors and a child with a guinea pig farm and a child with a stealing ferret,parrots, rats and basically a zoo, who can keep a clean house? We might not have had designer clothes, but we had clean and hole free clothes, and shoes that were suitable for the season. We might not have had alot growing up, but what we did have was special. We were the 5 marines, just us against the world..... the bonds between us are unbreakable, even if we fight, it will always be us against the world.
The 5 most important thing I learned from my mother
1. If you can read, you can do anything
2. Money doesn't = Love
3. Don't shot until you can see the whites of their eyes
4. Be kind to everyone, even if they don't deserve it
5. Kids need to get dirty
If I am half the mother my Mom is, I will be proud of myself, because her shoes are extreme hard to
fill!!
Happy Mothers Days!! ~ Angie
