HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!

Most of my mother's young life was spent living in the back room of the family store, but there were many times when the family was without a business and they had no place to live. She told me that she was in the second grade before she knew that people had furniture. She was use to sitting down to dinner on a wooden box at a table that was used in the daytime to make dough for donuts. She was invited once to a friends house after school and was introduced to lamps and couches with end tables adorned with lace and nick knacks. This was in Salt Lake City a good place to live. Later the family left to start over and lived in downtown Los Angeles, California not such a good place to live.

When High School started my mother was invited to move to Santa Ana, California and live with a cousin of her mother's. In that home she helped with two young children but there was lots of time for school, Church and learning the gospel and driving. She was taught and then immediately given a car to drive in the evening. Well one lesson went over her head and she never learned to park the car. All was well however, because her girl friend was a good driver and would park the car in the driveway and then walk home. One night her friend was too tired to walk and my mother had to go it alone. She tried for the driveway but ended up on the front lawn. The next morning she refused to speak and so no one knew she couldn't park and she got to keep driving. Getting your drivers licence was a lot easier in those olden days.

This year my children gave me the Mother's Day gift of writing memories from their younger years and relating things that were important to them. A recurring theme was the gift of having lots of time just to enjoy being young. My mother gave this to us too. Hours were spent in the big front yard of our little house in southern Utah. She taught us to appreciate roses as their perfume filled the hot summer days. The yard was full of trees that we could climb or just sit under and enjoy being cooled. There were few cars so we could play outside the green hedge and dip our feet in the irrigation water. Mother would always leave her work when we called and tell us a magical story then help us create a new game to play. Someone asked me how I knew so many games to play with young children and I answered because my mother played with us.

I don't know the process but even though my mother is in Heaven she has let me know that she and my father are championing us on our journey through this mission in India. How blessed I am to be born of this noble woman.