Mothers Day

Today is Mothers Day and I am missing mine. She passed to heaven in 1980... after I substituted send cards and became closer to my Grandmother. Now she has joined my Mother.

I come from a long line of independent women. My Great grandmother supported her children after the death of her first husband working in the Oklahoma oilfields doing a mans work. While he was living she worked the ranch as a farm/ranch hand while a 3 and 4 year old cooked for the family and took care of their sick father and paralysed brother. She taught them to read and write by age 3 my Grandmother could read and write. Later my Great granmother divorced her second husband when he tried to beat my Grandmother with a buggy whip. I n fact she took it away from him and beat him with it before throwing him out. In the 1920's she was a single mom in St Louis, unable to support her children my aunt and grandmother ( who was 13 at the time) took jobs and moved out of the home. My Grandmother told me that the woman she was a live-in maid for taught her a lot about social graces. Provided her books she never would have had access to otherwise. Again a blessing to me by an unknown woman. My great grandmother then ran the restaurant in the airport in east St Louis. Still she had to give up custody to her 5 children still at home in order to keep them together. She never forgave herself for her failures. I praise her for her perseverence and independence in a time when it was so hard for a woman to succeed alone. All of the women who supplied my history have taught me that I must rely on God and myself for support. That study and hard work will overcome the difficulties of life, that life is neither easy or fair. I feel that is still true and the current reliance on the government will only make sheep of everyone, we will not be able to take care of ourselves nor endure any of lifes hardships.