THANKFUL FRIDAY

Sometime around the beginning of April, I posted a picture of a goose who had decided to set up a nest on the rooftop outside my office. She laid five eggs and then settled in for a month, not moving but to rotate around every once and a while. We saw the goose’s partner only briefly in the beginning. The female goose sat all alone on the rooftop through dropping temperatures and downpours. At one time we even had a camera set up for a live feed of the goose. Then Jeff went to adjust it and accidentally broke the camera. Not just my office, but a number of people became fully vested in the survival of these geese. We worried and fretted over the dangers like our resident hawk and what happens when the eggs hatch.

I was scheduled to be at MBL when the eggs were expected to hatch. So I would check in every once and while to see if any of the eggs had hatched. No babies was always the response. One coworker even went in on Saturday to check. Finally, sometime on Sunday, the eggs hatched and when I got to work Monday morning there were five baby geese poking their little heads out from under their mother’s protective wing. Dad finally reappeared and the family was complete. Then we all started to fret over how these little geese were going to get down from the rooftop. Maintenance installed a ramp, which the geese avoided like it was hot lava. We would stand at the window and watch as they would all get close enough to the ramp to think they might give it ago. Then they’d dart off in the opposite direction. Finally, when the window washers made it to that area, we were able to convince them to toss the babies to the ground. Which they did. Like tossing a beanbag for a game of cornhole. They all landed safely and the family waddled off. We haven’t seen them since.

It does not go unnoticed that these eggs hatched so close to Mother’s Day. For this past month, this mother goose was a daily reminder of the struggles and hardships of motherhood and so many women do this every day alone. They get the kid up and ready for the day. If they’re fortunate, they get this kid fed breakfast before dropping them off at daycare/school. They’re the ones that show up when the school nurse calls. They’re the ones baking cupcakes at midnight for a last minute bake sale. They are the ones most often showing up. My dad did his best to help out with raising me. He volunteered for all the extracurricular activities. He was often in charge my evening meals and Sunday mornings he made mom and I breakfast and served it to us in bed. My dad brought me a tray of breakfast every Sunday morning like I was a gosh dang princess. I think he did pretty well for being raised with patriarchal ideas on gender roles.

Mom also volunteered. She made sure I was up and fed and ready for school each day. She made sure there was a responsible adult around at the end of a school day whether it be a neighbor or instructions to get off the school bus at one of the many church ladies that took turns looking after me. Mom spent countless hours lying on the sewing room floor while I struggled with sewing projects. She listened to me when I said I wanted to play the cello and made that happen by buying me a cello and finding me a teacher. She tolerated my goofiness whenever we were shoe shopping. She was the one who discovered USAO first and told me that this might be the school for me. We visited that school together and the moment we turned into the circle on campus, we both knew she was right. My mom made sure I stayed focused and was prepared for a successful future.

So for today, because it’s Mother’s Day weekend, this Thankful Friday moment of gratitude goes out to all those mothers who diligently sit on those eggs and protect those babies under their wings.

And my mom.

WHAT'S GOIN' ON

We went through pictures at Mom's last night

7 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "We went through pictures at Mom's last night"

I spent the weekend at my Mom's with my brother and sister-in-law. Our Mother's Day Weekend activities included a Tabouleh Festival in Bristow, where I was surprised to discover that there used to be a large Lebanese community. I was also surprised to find only one source of tabouleh and that one booth had a super long line. We left the the tabouleh festival without tabouleh, which was disappointing because we had planned to have tabouleh with dinner later that evening. So we left the Tabouleh Festival and headed over to a German festival. This was less festival and more 'pay us some money to enter our raffle so you can win this quilt covered in elephants'. We did have a beer and a pretzel. We did not win the raffle. At least I don't think any one of us did.

We left the German Festival and I said "now what?" Katrina, my sister-in-law, looked at her phone and said "there's a Latin Festival." This would have been almost perfect except we all decided that were all festivaled out and that maybe we should just go to the liquor store. That's what we did, but then we got distracted by plants on the way back to Mom's house. So now I have a hanging basket of pretty flowers that I don't know the name of. Then we spent the rest of the evening eating pizza, drinking gin and sorting through boxes of old photos. I came home with a pile of old pictures and a letter to Santa Claus my Dad had dictated to his mother in 1945. Dad had requested a bow and six arrows and a Buck Rogers gun. He also asked for some other things, but those were my favorites. 

I got home Sunday afternoon and then Josephine started puking her guts out. The two of us did very little sleeping Sunday night because of it. She puked in my bed. She puked in her bed. She had to go outside several times. She couldn't get comfortable. She was one sick puppy but not in a psycho kind of sick puppy way. I kept my cool and waited it out, but seriously was this close to panicking and rushing her to an emergency vet so I could spend half a million dollars for them to tell me that she just ate something bad. She's fine. I still have no idea what she got into except maybe all the grass she's been eating in the backyard. I stayed home with her on Monday so I could wash all the stuff she'd puked on and monitor her health. She was pretty mopey until I got the vacuum out. Then she mustered enough energy to attack the vacuum and I knew we were in the clear. 

Any way. I am home and things are returning back to some kind of normal. 

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Web

7 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Web"

We used to always go to the Black-Eyed-Pea for Mother's Day. My sister and I would cheer from the backseat of the car when Dad would suggest skipping church service to get to the restaurant early. We'd all meet back at the car after Sunday school. [I can see Michael reading this and trying to understand the difference between church service and Sunday school and marveling at how we spent almost four hours in church on Sundays.] Randy, Katrina and J would meet us at the restaurant and I'd get a Shirley Temple. I always finished my meal quickly at this place because there was a bookstore right next door. My parents would let me go hang out there while they finished up. I read one whole book from the Chronicles of Narnia series once while waiting on them to come get me. 

Mother's Day was much simpler then. 

I find that age and time have added a complicated layer to Mother's Day. For me, the day feels slightly forced. I know that is my own resistance to the idea of being thrown into the so called role of motherhood. It still sits awkwardly because I don't feel very motherly when it comes to the Cabbage. As I was leaving Dr. Mary's Tuesday night, she called me back to her office. She said "I started to tell you to have a good Mother's Day, but I stopped myself because you're not a mother. But then I thought 'No! You are a mother'. So Happy Mother's Day." That same evening, the Cabbage gave me an art project she made just for me, covered with elephant stickers and Happy Mother's Day written across it. I knew she was up to something because she picked out all of her supplies when we went to the craft store over the weekend. I guess I was surprised that it was all her idea. No one prompted her. I am still trying to wrap my head around how it is that she sees me as some kind of mother figure.  

I am also keenly aware of just how difficult Mother's Day is for others. At times, this made up holiday seems a little cruel. You cannot avoid all of the marketing that goes out regarding the celebration of mothers. That has got to be hard for people who no longer have their mothers with them, but it also has to be difficult to be a mother and no longer have your children with you. Maybe part of the reason I resist being on the receiving end of Mother's Day is that I know that the statement that motherhood is hard is simplifying the actuality. I don't feel worthy of the title because I have not experienced the emotions that mothers experience. I have not experienced the joys and the struggles that come with being a mother. It is more like I occasionally dabble in motherhood and that's mostly by just making sure the Cabbage has clothes that fit her. And carrots to eat. But I guess this enitittles me to a moment of kindness and lots of elephant stickers.

Of course I am thankful for my own mother. She held my house together while my life was falling apart. And I am thankful for the tribe of women my mother relied on to help raise me. I am thankful for the lessons they taught me and I am thankful my mother had that support. I read a lot blogs written by women who are mothers, not because they are moms, but because they are amazing writers. I am thankful for those women for sharing their words and craft. I am thankful for the example they lead and how they encourage each other. I am thankful for all of the women bloggers I read, mothers or not because of the way they encourage each other. I follow a good crowd of women. It makes me want to be a better person.

It gives me hope. 

THANKFUL FRIDAY

My mother was my first feminist role model.  I mean she was no Gloria Steinem, but she was my first memory of seeing a woman doing the things only men were supposed to do as men told women to do them. She was that woman who could and did  bring home the bacon and then fry it up in a pan. As soon as I started preschool, mom started working on her associates in business. Then she went right on into the work force where she struggled just like all the other women to balance work and home and being a "good" mother. She was my first example of a woman having pride in her work. She didn't just have a job because we needed the money. We did at times really need the money, but her job gave her a special sense of purpose. She was the first woman in my life to teach me those things were possible. 

In fourth grade, I fell off the top of the monkey bars and broke my arm during lunch recess. My mom worked as a greeting cards rep for American Greeting at the time. She had to travel all over Oklahoma visiting stores that sold American Greeting cards. Dad was working in a top secret area of American Airlines. It probably wasn't really top secret, but he couldn't get phone calls. The school didn't have any phone records for me. They couldn't get a hold of either parent. The only thing they could do was send someone over to the high school to fetch my sister. Janell sat with me in the principal's office and patted my back while I rested my head on a desk and cried. We sat there until my dad got off work at 3:30. My mom was so upset that there hadn't been a way for the school to contact her about my broken arm that she went to the greeting card company and demanded they provide her with a cell phone. This would have been somewhere around 1985. From then on my mom drove around with this giant cell phone/bag contraption in her car so that she could be reached in cases of emergencies. 

I know she felt bad about all of that. I know she felt guilt for not being there and knowing that I sat for so long with out medical attention and in serious pain. I know it's something that truly bothered her. I'd like to think I was not the kind of child that ever said anything to her about her not being there. I don't remember being overly upset about her not being there, but to be fair I was in some pain and things are blurry from that day. I do know that I never told her that I was OK with her not being there. I never said "hey, really, it's OK Mom." Because it was. I probably should have told her that. I probably should tell her that. I should tell her that I know she would have been there in a heart beat if they had been able to contact her. I also know that her job wasn't just important to her, but without her income, I would have missed out on soooo much. I should say to her that it was Dad's turn. Mom was there through all of the crap with the first broken arm. She was the one who took me to countless doctors appointments, to get my tonsils out, to the allergists. She was the one who took me to get my wisdom teeth out and was the one who dealt with the skin crawling incident that resulted from the pain meds they gave me after my wisdom teeth surgery. I am thankful that she was there, but more importantly, I am thankful that she is the type of mom who wants to be there. Because really, she has always been there when it truly mattered to me.

I hope she has a lovely and relaxed Mother's Day and I hope that all the seeds I sent her are thriving. Just like me. 

Happy Thankful Friday!