Post #132 – Women’s Memoirs, ScrapMoir – Matilda Butler and Kendra Bonnett
Congratulations to Final ALL ABOUT MOTHERS Memoir Writing Contest Winner
Today, we are pleased to publish the final Honorable Mention winner in our May Memoir Writing Contest that gave women an opportunity to share their storytelling skills about the topic of mothers. We offer our congratulations to Cindy Wilber for her lovingly told story in the MOTHERS AND MOTHERING category.
Congratulations Cindy on your award-winning memoir vignette.
I CALLED HER MOM
By Cindy Wilber
“Mom you save all your work for me to do on Saturday morning! I know it! I just know that is what you do!!”
“Cissi (the name my family called me while I was growing up), you are not going to get out of doing your chores by saying that.”
“I hate doing the silver, I hate it. It just gets tarnished again and again and again. Why did you ever get silver in everything you have anyway? I want to go with my friends this afternoon and to the dance tonight and I’ll never be able to go with all the chores I have to do.”
“Cissi, you still need to polish the silver no matter how upset you get. Your chores on Saturday take about an hour to do and you spend more time arguing than it would take to do them.”
“This is ridiculous – when I get married I’m never going to have sterling silver. I’m telling you that.”
My mom
Whoops did I hear her say “If you want to go out tonight?” I can’t believe she would say that to me. We’ll I guess I better get this silver polished if I want to go to the dance tonight.
Reluctantly I say, “Okay Mom, I’ll start working on the silver…”
………….
That conversation with my mother took place approximately 53 years ago when I was 16 years old. We were in the dining room of our home in Los Altos and Mom was showing me what silver she wanted me to polish. I was acting towards her in my usual rebellious and ungrateful attitude. I have replayed this “tape” in my brain numerous times over the years. How little I knew at that time about what my mother did in our household during the week. As I became a mother and grandmother I have smiled and chuckled when I think of how my mother put up with my very childish behavior.
Another story about my Mom that comes to my mind on numerous occasions is the one that occurred when my Dad was stationed in the Navy in Norfolk, Virginia.
I was a little over ten years old. Mom was the scout leader for my Girl Scout troop and had planned a day hike for us at Camp Matoaka, located about an hour from Norfolk. The hike was scheduled for Saturday, October 11, 1952 and there were ten of us going. The fall in Virginia is spectacular; the trees start changing colors in early October. The red maple leaves were a brilliant scarlet, while the dogwood leaves displayed a purple tone and the ash leaves were more of a yellow to a maroon color. I doubt if I appreciated the beauty at that young age as much as I do now.
The morning of October 11, my Mom was up early preparing breakfast for our family, which included my Dad, 16-year old brother Bill and 13-year old sister Carol. My younger sister Candi was not born yet. She showed up two years later but that is another story. While the family was eating, Mom was finishing up making our lunches, which included my favorite peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and a couple of snacks for the afternoon including apples to make sure we had a healthy snack.
Before I knew it, Mom said “It is time to leave Cissi, get your jacket and meet me in the car. We need to leave right now.”
“OK Mom. I just need to use the bathroom.”
We left our house a few minutes later and Mom drove to the assistant scout leader’s house where the other nine girls and a chaperone were waiting for us. I went with my Mom and three other scouts in our car. The remaining six scouts were split into two cars, half went with the chaperone and the remaining three with the assistant scout leader.
As I sat in the car traveling to the camp I remembered the fun times I had at Camp Matoaka the previous summer. I loved paddling my canoe out in the lake – splashing my friends with the paddle and racing them back to the shore. The swimming area was such fun; the water was dark and mysterious, not at all like the pool at gym class. That pool was so clear you could see your feet when you looked down. The pool at camp was filled with the water from Prince lake located next to Camp Matoaka. The water was a misty green; you could not see your feet while standing in it, and it was very mysterious looking to me. I loved the mystery of it and the fun I had swimming in it. Then there was the archery range. Setting your arrow in your bow and trying to hit the bull’s eye on the target. Can’t say I hit it very often (or at all) but it was sure fun trying.
That day in October, I was wearing my usual camping clothes – a dark plaid blouse, rolled up jeans and blue tennis shoes (my hiking boots in those days). Of course I had my girl scout knife and first aid supplies in my pouch as well as a bandana (never knew when you would need your bandana for a tourniquet or to put around your neck to help with the perspiration.) Before I knew it , we had arrived at camp. My mom gathered us all together to tell us the plans for the day. We would eat our snack first in the area in front of the hall where we always ate our meals during summer camp. Then we would break into two groups for the hike. She explained where we would be hiking and passed out a list of the trees, birds and animals we would be looking for on the hike. She talked about the need for two groups so there would have time to identify and talk about the flora/fauna we found on our hike. Mom, the chaperone, and five scouts would be the lead group, called Group One. The assistant leader and the rest of the scouts, including me, would be in the second group (with one of the older scouts at the back of Group Two). This meant there would be two guides in each group. The plan was that we would eat our lunches half way through the hike then return back to the gathering area for a snack and wrap-up discussion before returning home.
After questions and answers, Mom said “Let’s go – Group One follow me.” Off went my Mom and her group. My group followed about fifteen minutes later.
We were on the trail for probably 30 minutes and I remember our biggest challenge was trying very hard not to come into contact with any poison ivy that was everywhere on the trail. We had even been warned about snakes being on the trail and to be sure to avoid them.
“Yikes,” I said, “you’ve got to be kidding about snakes on the trail.”
The assistant leader said, “I’m just trying to tell you they might be there, most likely not, but be aware they could be on or near the trail.”
“Well, I’m sure they won’t be out at this time of the year,” I said, hoping they wouldn’t be there.
It wasn’t more than 10 minutes after the talk about snakes when two of the scouts from Group One came rushing back down the trail looking quite upset. One of them said “Do any of you have a sharp knife on you?”
I asked, “Why do you need a sharp knife?”
“Just check very quickly and I’ll tell you why.” We all looked in our pouches where our knives were and no one seemed to have a really sharp knife. Then the scout said “Mrs. Tagg just got bitten by a poisonous snake. None of us had a sharp knife to cut an “x” over the wound. With a knife, the chaperone could suck the blood and poison out of the wound.”
(Note: The procedure used in the ‘50s to remove the poison from a snake bite is not the procedure used in the current day when you get a snake bite!)
“You mean my Mother was bitten by a snake?”
“Yes, and the other chaperone said it is urgent that we find a sharp knife.” And off the scouts went to where we started our hike hoping to find someone with a sharp knife.
“But how do they know it is a poisonous snake?” I said to the assistant leader.
“I’m not sure, Cindy. I just know that we need to get where your mother is very quickly.”
It was another fifteen minutes before we caught up with Group One. Those fifteen minutes seemed like an eternity to me. I was a nervous wreck. A million things went through my mind and they were all bad things with bad endings. I cried and then tried to be brave. Then one of the girls said to me “I’ve heard you can die if a poisonous snake bites you.” That just made me start crying again.
We came to the area where the snake had bitten my Mom, but she was not there. The chaperone was still there and told us that two fishermen happened to drive by on the roadway that was very close to our trail. One of the scouts was down by the roadway and was able to stop the them. Both of the fishermen had sharp knives with them. They climbed up the short embankment to the trail where my mom was and cut the “x” over the area where the snake had bitten her. Then one fisherman sucked the blood out and spit it on the ground. They helped carry my mom to their car and took off for the nearest hospital, which if I remember, was about half an hour away.
Well, what was I to think now? The chaperone felt they got the poison out of Mom’s ankle and that they would get to the hospital in time to save her. She tried to console me and it seemed to work to a certain extent. I just wanted to see Mom and talk with her before I believed she was all right.
We all hiked back to where we first gathered in the morning. There were a couple of men there that had been working on the camp buildings and had gone looking for the snake that had bitten my Mother. It turns out there were two copperhead snakes and they were mating. They figure my Mom had her jacket tied around her waist and maybe it slipped down where the snakes were mating, covering them. One of the snakes immediately struck out and bit my Mom in retaliation.
Since Mom had been taken to the hospital, the assistant leader and chaperone decided the best thing to do was to take us all home. After arriving home, my older brother Bill told me one of the fishermen had called Dad and told him what happened. My dad had driven to the hospital to see Mom. Mom came out of this trauma with no problems. She remained calm during the entire trauma. I think she was more worried about her troop then she was about herself.
………………….
Here’s a little history. Mom, Elinore Bergliott Lofthus, was born October 30, 1913. She met my father, William Tagg, in the shipyards in Bremerton, Washington where he was stationed with the Navy. After a short courtship they married on June 21, 1935.
While reading through some notes, letters and stories my mother had written, I came across this description that she wrote about herself.
“Wife of a Naval officer, homemaker all my life, had four children, six grandchildren, worked as a Girl Scout leader for seven years, traveled all over the U.S. (lived in 19 places over our married life) while my husband was in the service and managed wedding receptions at my church for 15 years.”
What a humble person Mom was. What a loving and encouraging mother she was to me. She was the “rock” in our family. She was the one that held our family together. With my father’s service in the Navy she was often “the man” in the household. She was the one that was home all the time. Dad was often gone and more of a stranger to me while I was growing up. Mom was the one I came to with my struggles and my joys. I felt secure with her. I felt loved by her.
“I called her Mom” and how proud I was and am to say she was my mom.
