MeMa
Well, I must tell y’all that it by no means escapes my notice that on the day following my ranting post about a rude stranger I am here again to write about someone so diametrically opposed to him that she might as well have not inhabited the same universe.

My father’s mother, Mema, passed away last night. She was 97.

Mema. What a lady, y’all, what a lady.

For my entire life, my Dad has told me that his mother had raised her 7 children without raising her voice. The older I get and the more children that I have the more I am awed by this. It almost seems too incredible to be believed. But all you had to do was to meet her and you’d believe it. And, even though I wasn’t there, I would bet that not raising her voice was not an impressive self-control issue. For her I just think that she knew that it made no sense to raise her voice and so she didn’t do it.

She was an exceedingly happy person and her sincerity ran all the way down to her soul. She truly delighted in simple things. She loved flowers. She loved hoeing in her garden. She loved putting up jars and jars and jars of her homegrown vegetables. She made delicious fig preserves. She just liked doing things. She never worried about anything. Negativity had no place in her mind. She just had a peaceful spirit. How many people are like that?

Growing up, I heard both of my parents say many times that Mema had “a lot of faith”. Now, they weren’t really talking about a Christian-type of faith here, although she did have that, too. It is hard to really describe this trait adequately with words, but I think that it can be summed up by saying that she was an optimistic realist who just inherently knew that most things in this life were not a big deal. Most people find out this little nugget of wisdom, eventually. She always knew it and she lived her life accordingly.

Mema was a very accomplished upside-finder. An marvelous, phenomenal upside-finder — the likes of which most people will never know. Especially when you consider the challenges that she faced.

Since I’ve had my boys, I’ve found myself thinking about my Mema more and more. I think that the reason for this is that we share a kinship that goes beyond our DNA. We share the kinship of having a child with a disability. Her oldest son has cerebral palsy. My Dad said recently that my Uncle Buddy had been her baby for 76 years. She always took exceptional care of him.

Long before I knew of my oldest son’s autism diagnosis I was telling some of my friends about my Mema and my Uncle Buddy. I told them how seeing their relationship and her service to him was like a gift to anyone who saw it. The gift of seeing them is even more precious to me now that I’m living it in my own way.

In the last few years of her life, Mema lived in a nursing home. Uncle Buddy moved there, too. Her mind was going and his physical needs were just too much to manage at home anymore. I don’t know how long it has been since she recognized me — years, I’m sure. And she hasn’t known even her own children for awhile now. All except for Buddy, she always knew him.

And, now, I’m going to end my rambling with a story that my Mom told me a few years ago. Mom told me that most of Mema’s children were gathered in her hospital room following surgery on her hip. Mema was recovering from the anesthesia and was looking around the room at people that she no longer recognized. As the time went on, she noticed that the light was falling outside and said to one of her sons, “Hey, mister, I don’t know you, but I was wondering if you could give me a ride home?” He explained about it all…about how he was her son, about how she had just had surgery, about how everything was fine and she didn’t need to go home. But that wouldn’t do, for her. She knew that night was coming and she thought that she needed to be home. So she asked them again to take her home. And then she shocked them all by shouting at them, telling them that she really, really needed to get home. Finally, her voice breaking, she said to them, “Please, you don’t understand. I have this son and he’s handicapped, you see? I have to get home. Who’s going to fix him dinner and put him to bed and cover him up? Who? I need to get home.”

To me, that is just the sweetest story. It’s the story of a mother’s love and devotion that superceded every other memory. She did not understand about her own health. She did not remember her husband of over 50 years. She did not even recognize her children who were in that room at the time who were comforting her and telling her that everything was fine. All she knew, for certain, was that she had a son and that he needed her.

So, here is to Mema and to her life and how she lived it so graciously. There will never be another.