Wednesday, February 3, 2021

MOMMY, DO YOU LOVE ME?

Weekly Scribblings at Poets & Storytellers United, and Rosemary asks us to consider how we become like our parents.  This occasioned some soul searching for me.  I loved and admired my mother a great deal, but I tended to be a daddy's girl.    Submitted February 3, 2021

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Mother loved everything about living on a farm.  She loved to grow things and my father used to say she'd turn the whole farm into patches if he let her.  She was forever starting what she called patches --a strawberry patch, a blackberry patch, a sweet corn patch, a melon patch and so on.  She loved flowers and she loved to garden.  I, on the other hand, would prefer sitting under a shade tree and reading a book.  During my growing up years I dutifully did farm chores, all the while planning to finish school, get a job, and become a city girl! I have often said my mother was like the little hen who hatched a goose egg,  and looked at me in wonderment thinking "where in the world did THAT come from!"  I do find that I inherited some of her good traits, such as frugality, saving something for a rainy day, and being fiercely independent.  I think it would be a great compliment if someone would say "She's just like her mother", but sadly that will never be the case.  One of my childhood memories is lying next to her in bed one night and saying, "Mommy, do you love me?" and she replied "Of course I do", and I asked "Much as there are stars in the sky?" and she replied "Much as there are stars in the sky"  and I wonder why did the child who was me have to ask......   

9 comments:

  1. My mom and I are different in a lot of ways, but we both share an iron will to make a situation work for us in any way that we can.

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  2. I understand this so very well. I too am a daddy's girl, but I think I get the majority of my traits from my mother. She is also a very pragmatic woman so words of affection didn't come as easily as did the showing of it. I love the "chicken who hatched the goose" how can we be so alike and yet so entirely different.

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  3. A fascinating reminiscence. Thank you for sharing. In my family it was my dad who loved to garden. Although I was a Daddy's girl as well (though sadly disappointed in him later) I was like you, preferring to sit not under but in a tree, reading a book, than to do any gardening myself. I too would have needed to ask if my Mum loved me. I don't think I ever did, but she finally told me so in no uncertain terms when she was quite old, after I said something indicating that I took it for granted she preferred my cousin. It was an amazingly precious moment, coming so late in both our lives.

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  4. ~ ‘the child who was you’ a fascinating way to refer to you with your mother that night. This is incredibly deep, profound.

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  5. Age old question, you had to ask. At what age, I wonder, did you start milking cows? I was tricked into it by my dad at age four or five. I knew my dad didn't love me but Mom sure did!! And I too left the farm.
    ..

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  6. Sweet read, love getting to know a little through your blog for I am venturing out of my comfort zone in blog reading, not disappointed in yours.

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  7. Mmmm. A truly delicious poem - the details and introspection and that little girl voice at the end... priceless. A true gem. Very moving.

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