Previous Challenge Entry (Level 2 – Intermediate)
Topic: HERO (10/01/20)
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TITLE: The Hand That Rocks the Cradle | Previous Challenge Entry
By Tana Craig
10/07/20 -
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As a female, the people I looked up to and wanted to emulate were women; my Mother and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. But Mother, a Christian, lived out her faith daily and was my Hero. I was ill a lot and was diagnosed with a connective disease at a young age. Mom nursed me through many flare-ups- fever, chills, body aching all over. We spent a lot of time together.
Christmas in the 1940s, it was raining, and Mom helped set up my new (used), tiny, electric stove in our garage. She cut bread in small squares, we toasted them in the oven, and had a tea party with my child-sized china set. I remember the feel of those moments, the smell of the bread and tea, the taste of that crunchy toast. The rain pounding on the roof while we had fun together made my play area cozy, magical. A hero was a Mother who took the time to enter my fantasy world.
Mother was beautiful and, even with three young children, wore dresses and makeup. She mourned the loss of summer and our return to school. Once or twice per school year, Mother would announce a Golden Day. She would keep us out of school, and we would do something fun. Sometimes the Golden Day was in December. We would jump in the Model A sedan and take off for Los Angeles to Ooo! and Ahhh! At the May Company and Bullock's animated Christmas windows. We'd lunch out somewhere fun and order whatever we wanted for lunch. A hero was a woman who loved to surprise her children.
Mother had activities outside our home. She sang in and sometimes directed the church choir; was always a room mother for our classrooms and president of the P.T.A. for one or two years. Mother wrote poems and was a member of California's Chaparral Poets when I was in high school. A Hero modeled leadership and Godly actions. She made childhood enjoyable regardless of my poor health, and even though our dad sometimes came home in the middle of the night drunk and scary. That's another story.
I was volunteering as room mother for my son's classroom and thought back over how busy the three of us kids kept her when we were in school. When my sister, Anne, brother David and I were children, we were always the first to raise our hands when our teachers asked, "Who will? The following poem I wrote from my Mother's point of view when I was in my thirties.
VOLUNTEERS THREE
You need:
A costume designed by a week from tomorrow?
A director for the grade school play?
Someone who writes poems, has a few you can borrow?
A baker of cupcakes - you need them today?
I have just the person to fill these positions
no matter how hard or how varied they be,
For, except for a few rare and brief intermissions,
my children are right there to volunteer -
Me!
When my son was in high school, I experienced the life cycle repeating, how it felt to be the Mother of almost-grown children. I wrote:
THE PEW
When we were young, we went to church with Mother,
Daddy stayed at home and worked around the house.
We heard the Good News preached as we nestled
up against our Mother's side and colored
in her bulletin,
unaware of how much we were absorbing.
Mother sang in her strong alto voice
and smiled down at us.
Scripture thundered down around our heads.
We grew. The world called out to us.
One by one, we left the little church
and Mother sat,
alone.
Long years later, I began
to take my young son to a little church.
He grew up fast against my side,
coloring in my bulletin,
listening to me sing as I smiled down at him,
all those years my Mother sat,
alone.
I returned to Christ; my husband now is going with me to church. My son is following, so far, his Hero, his Father, who died when he was 19. Will my son remember some of the love of God that I showed him? My prayer is for my son and grandchildren to answer the Holy Spirit's call and follow Christ.
My Hero is the woman of Proverbs 31:10-31. She is my Mother, now I heaven.
"An excellent wife, who can find, for her price is far above rubies." Prov.31:10
Non-fiction
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