Violets for a mother whose voice still lingers

Even with each passing year, I still hear my mother’s voice in my ear. She had a saying for everything. Don’t count your chickens before they’ve hatched. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Two wrongs don’t make a right.

An only child born in 1928, she quit high school to get married to a handsome soldier who was about to ship off to fight in World War II. Her goal in life was to become a good mother. It took nine years of struggle and three miscarriages before she got her wish in 1952 with the birth of identical twins. Five more pregnancies, and then there were six girls.

When five of us were in grade school, she decided we needed a sisters’ club in the basement after school. Our mother’s agenda was to put the endless bickering at bay by distracting us with making potholders. We hated the club. None of us had the heart to tell her. As an only child, she had always wanted siblings, and how dare we be ungrateful. Her homemade chocolate pudding won us over for a few months.

One day we headed out to pick wild violets, her favorite flowers, to surprise her. When we bestowed them upon her, we stood shoulder to shoulder before her and outstretched our arms. When she put all our tiny stems together, we had fashioned a bountiful bunch, with deep purples and light blues and white.

Our mother had many fears. Learning to drive a car, riding elevators but never escalators, and worrying about our rash choices as teenagers. She wrote children’s stories and sent opinion essays to local newspapers, and she published some, too.

I remember when she told my father she needed to get a job, and he forbade it. But she won that argument, as she knew how much groceries cost. Besides, we kids were getting older, and she needed to take her multitasking talents and put them to better use.

She proved to be a valuable secretary at Vitro Laboratories, then worked as a legal secretary, and later she became a personal secretary to James Rouse, who spearheaded the development of Columbia, Md.

During the women’s liberation movement in the early 1970s, I saw my father vacuum the living room, at her insistence. She began to assert her independence, so much so that I saw her go streaking in the backyard during a rainstorm. My father stood at the back door and called her crazy. I laughed.

She disliked Mother’s Day, because she thought every day should be mother’s day. Every day we should be grateful for food on the table, for goodnight kisses, for clean socks and underwear. We even argued about underwear.

If you can imagine that many sisters living in one household, it was inevitable that one of us would swipe something they needed from someone else’s drawer. I had used my babysitting money to buy a fancy, multi-colored pack of seven panties, with the days of the week embroidered on their backsides, and sure enough, Wednesday went missing one day! I was determined to retrieve what was mine and mine alone!

None of my sisters would own up and drop their drawers. I waited until midnight and then lifted the sheets on every bed, hoping to spot the Wednesday threads. I’m not naming names here, but I did identify the thief.

My mother’s saying, “Two wrongs don’t make a right,” was planted in my adolescent brain, right along with, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall inherit the earth.” So I let the sleeping sister snooze, but I’m certain I got even somehow.

Along with secrets, arguments, popsicles and the sprinkler, my sisters and I shared our commitment and never-ending love for our mother. And I wish I could whisper that in her ear, because with age comes wisdom. Right, Mom? I miss you still, and hope you are square dancing in heaven with Dad.

Reach Lisa Graff at lgraff1979@gmail.com. Find her on Facebook by searching Our Senior Yearbook; on Twitter @#lisajgraff1 and at her website, lisajgraff.com.