Yesterday I read in Guidepost magazine about a lady who wrote letters to her daughter from the time her daughter went to camp until the lady died at 92. It reminded me of letters from my own Mama.
I'm sure I have written before that my mother did not finish high school. After her freshman year, she had rhuematoid arthritis and was bedridden for most of a year. She never went back to school.
She read lots of magazines and taught herself proper English and could spell almost any word that was in common usage.
She wrote letters to her mother and sisters - and maybe even to her brothers. She wrote letters to my brothers when they were in the service. She wrote letters to them and their wives when they got married. I guess I could say my mother was definitely a letter writer!
She began writing to me when I went away to college - a letter every week. I haunted my dorm mailbox waiting for those letters. She wrote about the things that were happening in my little home town and about the people I knew, keeping me up to date.
She continued writing those letters to me when I got married and moved to Ft. Riley. Several years later she continued writing letters when our little family moved to Iowa - where I knew only my husband and my daughter. It was a very lonely time for me. Mom's letters came regularly and helped me feel not so alone.
She wrote letters when we moved her out of her home in 1982. Then she spent time with my brother and his family in Kansas City and with my oldest brother in Castle Rock.
When she finally moved to Castle Rock permanently, the letters stopped because we spoke on the phone once a week. Somehow, talking on the phone really didn't take the place of those weekly letters. Now, I wish I had kept some of those letters so I could go back a revisit that simpler time of my life.
No comments:
Post a Comment