So, what did your mother do right?

In My Humble Opinion
61

When I was old enough to get a job but not old enough to drive and we lived on the farm, she would just putz around the city until 9 or 10pm when I got off work. She probably spent more money to stave off boredom during that time than I made, but she realized it was important for me to learn how to work and be proud of earning my own pocket money. To expand on that, she taught me the value of a dollar and how to be fiscally responsible.

She’s my best friend and I know that I can rely on her for anything. She does the sweetest things like send me cards in the mail if she knows I’m feeling down or hide a gift bag in my apartment when she visits and tells me later ‘check in that cabinet!’.

She did her best to hide my father’s alcoholism and make sure I had everything I could ever want even as he pissed the money away.

She’s the most awesome person I’ve ever known!

62

Not at all sugar,. At the risk of hyperbole, reading all these memories is sort of saving my sanity, so soon after my mom’s passing. Serendipity is a beautiful thing.

63

It makes me kind of sad that the time of our lives that our mothers lavish the most love and care on us is when we’re too young to remember it. I see mothers taking their kids to the zoo, the museum, etc., trying their best to keep their kids engaged, fire their imaginations, and so on, and the kids have no appreciation of it at all.
I wish I knew what all my mom did for me when I was little, since it would probably help me resent her less for being the less-than-perfect mom I remember.
That said, it’s undeniable that my mom deserves high praise for encouraging our creativity and providing us with materials to draw and paint and do crafts with.
She did a good job of keeping her own fears and insecurities to herself and letting us do things she was afraid to do, like swim, or speak in public.
She encouraged us to be unconventional and weird and different. A lot of moms wouldn’t do that.

64

My mom taught me how to be Martha Stewart.

Our maids taught me to respect ALL work. One of them called me in from play to watch the results of the assassination of JFK, because it was IMPORTANT, not because it was racist. Note that this was in Central Virginia and that she was White.

Things Down South were less-complex than they were on PBS documentaries.

65

Yeah; my mother actually chickened out of my abortion at the doctor’s office. She got beat up for that.

66

*Absolutely did not censor my reading in any way. Which was interesting when I stumbled over her copy of The Story of O - looking back on it (I was about 14 at the time, I think), she was trying very hard not to flip out and take it away and burn it immediately. She sat down and explained to me that if I really wanted to finish the book, I should, but that I needed to understand that it was fictional and I should never ever let anyone treat me the way O did. It was probably a little early to get into the concept on consensual BDSM, so I think that was the best way to handle it at the time. Especially considering what her kneejerk reaction must’ve been.

*There was also the period in high school where I was dying my hair a different colour every month. One of our neighbours expressed amazement that my mother let me do it, and she laughed and replied “If dying her hair is the worst she’s doing, I’m thrilled”.

*Taught me, through example, an amazing professional work ethic. She’s got a serious case of Type-A personality, and I really, really don’t - except in the case of my job. In fact, at my last review, I got called ‘too professional’.

*Puts up with the Mongol horde of friends of my step-father and us three kids that don’t have anyone to spend the holidays with. Every christmas and thanksgiving we have one or two strays at the table and she loves feeding them and welcoming them into her warm and cozy house.

*Is currently going through the ‘supporting your parents’ phase with my Nana, her mother, made more difficult by Nana’s alzheimers. She’s giving me a pretty good idea of how make sure the elderly generation of family members should be taken care of, while maintaining their dignity and independance, but not forgotten or pushed away from the rest of the family.

In fact, she’s upstairs right now making pork and apple pie for post-thanksgiving brunch. I’m gonna go give her a hug.

67

My mum instilled me a tolerance, and eventually a love, for vegetables and fruits. I will just calmly chomp up on the greens other would avoid, such as bitter-gourds and such.

She also trained me to be independent; I have to do the grocery and etc. A lot of young kids here are spoiled by their parents having maids from poorer countries (it’s a Singapore thing) and a lot of them have terrible attitude.

68

Positive:
She taught me to read
She left me alone to figure stuff out without trying to indoctrinate me into anything (by being a working mother)

Negative:
She taught me to fear idiocy (because she’s not the brightest bulb)
She taught me to have to listen to others (because she talks over everyone else)

Obviously, she instilled in me a great and true family spirit. :wink:

69

She let it be known to me and to the world that she could do anything. And anything she tried, she did. Because of that, I know I can. She has a contractor’s level of knowledge she’s just picked up, she finished medical school in 3 years, and she’s never gotten a traffic ticket after having been pulled over in ten years.

She led by example. She didn’t say “here, learn how to paint a room”, she just took me along and I saw, and then I did. She was very big into doing-it-yourself, even at a young age. I made my own doctor appointments at 11 or 12; I made meals shortly thereafter. Even though we had nearly full-time help (3 kids, 2 people working 60-70 hours/week), I wasn’t spoiled or babied, something I can’t say for my peers, regardless of socioeconomic level.

She taught me to haggle, to barter, and how to work the system, and that the more people respected you, the more they were willing to cut you a deal. A lot of people with her level of education and expertise would be scornful of others; the people she gets along with are extremely good at what they do - painters and plumbers as well as teachers and other medical professionals. She taught me her brand of feminism - which is that women can multitask much better than men (now with science to back it up!), and that flirting to get what you want is never wrong, because you’re simply preying on another’s weakness.

She made me do uncomfortable things to make me more confident. I have a benign skin condition that turned a lot of heads when I was young; rather than encourage me to wear clothes or makeup to hide it, she encouraged/slightly pushed me into competitive swimming. She loved when I won a race, only to get out and have parents stare at me, wondering if I was contagious. Her fierce pride instilled a ton of confidence.

She taught me to seek a man who would had the same goals, both monetary and professionally, as I did. He wasn’t supposed to be responsible for me, and I wasn’t supposed to be responsible for him.

Above all, she taught me that the mind is stronger than the body - that I could literally will myself to win a race. She has three slipped discs and arthritis in her back, but she will outhike my father, just to prove that she can. It’s not rational, but it is amazing.

So, at 22, I’ve skipped a grade, I can remodel a bathroom, paint a home, ace just about any test, and work through political, institutional, and landlord bureaucracy unlike anyone my age, and unlike most adults. My friends joke that when they have a crisis (landlord, problem with a professor, any random issue) that they ask me what to do - because if anyone knows, it’s lindsaybluth

70

Catholic school, huh?

71

I’m sorry for your loss, pharris. That was a beautiful tribute to your mother.

My mother always let me know that she loved me absolutely. She has her flaws and she can be a difficult person, but she’s a very loving person and everyone sees that in her. I’m sure a lot of the things she did for me would be considered spoiling me if she asked for advice on this board, but now I just remember the feeling of being loved unconditionally. I hope that as an adult I don’t still expect to be the centre of the universe, but have rather learned how to treat other people.

She allowed me to read whatever I liked and bought me tons of books. My parents were recently cleaning out their basement and they found some projects they helped me with in elementary school. She built a model medieval castle out of wood for me and helped me decorate it. There was also a model of the terrain of Egypt made out of some stuff that my father had been redoing the ceiling with (I know, it’s hard to picture). I think she genuinely enjoyed these projects - I noticed that among all the pyramids, there was one small perfectly formed one, clearly made by a different person. I suspect my mother couldn’t resist joining in. I passed her educational level a long time ago and occasionally get frustrated when she doesn’t understand fundamentally what I’m doing, but I have to stop and remind myself that she’s the reason I got as far as I did. And she still listens to me patiently even when I go on about things she doesn’t understand.

72

I love my mother fiercely. She built home-made explosives with me in the backyard when I was nine, after reading a detective novel that outlined the chemicals required. We went to the chemist’s together and then tried all sorts of variations for the best ‘flare’. She let me firewalk at a local Skeptics Association congregation when I was eleven, fostered my love of flora and fauna, let me read anything I could get my grubby paws on, and is generally an incredible individual. She reads an average of two-three books (novels, biographies, anything that catches her interest) per week and thinking about it, I would say the gift I value the most from her is an appreciation and hunger for knowledge and learning, particularly about the natural world. She treats everybody exactly the same and would probably make a burglar a cup of tea. When I saw ‘Grey Gardens’, the two Edies were exuding so much of my mother that it was like watching a home movie. She can tell a joke better than anyone I’ve met and has a hilarious skewed sense of humour - she makes me laugh so hard I have to beg for mercy and even smokes a joint with me now and again. Our new catchphrase is ‘A BABY STOLE MY DINGO!’ She is amazing. Thanks Ma, love you so fucking much.