2020 - Gratitude Day #3 - The Right to Vote

 Gratitude Day #3

Today is election day for the United States, and I am grateful for the right to vote.

My mom would have age seven when women were given the right to vote. It was very important for both her and dad to have their Voter Registration Card. It was on or near my eighteenth birthday that they took me to the Board of Elections, and I became a registered voter.

There was one caveat. We keep our voting preferences private. And, I do mean private.

I'm not sure if I ever knew who my parents voted for. Mom used to tell me of the trouble she witnessed in both Kentucky and West Virginia on election day, so it was best if you kept your cards close to your chest. 

One scene bears out strongly in my mind. I was a young girl, and had gone to a funeral with my parents. I don't recall if it was my grandfather or one of mom's two brothers. She lost them three years in a row - all in November.

All of the men had gathered in the dining room. I was young and squirrely, and likely bored. But, the conversation then turned to politics and religion, and the talk became heated. Mom gave me "eye" to go on upstairs and get ready for bed. I did, but I still wanted to listen. So, I snuck over to the top of the stairs and peaked through the banister. 

What a show! Fists were waving! People were hollering! And, I got a little bit scared.

Then, the arguing went to the living room - to the front porch - to the front yard - right out into the road.

And, I was bouncing around the upstairs like I was in a pinball machine, running from window to window.

Of course, nothing was settled. 

So, this is why you do not see me post on social media, or even discuss with friends who we vote for. Some people may think they know...and have even called me names on Facebook. It did nothing but make me lose respect for them.

We took three of our four children to the Board of Elections on or near the eighteenth birthday. With one of them, we had just returned from Utah, had a day and a half to get that child ready and celebrate their birthday before the Army Recruiter picked them up.

So today, with a country in turmoil, slinging accusations, demeaning others for who they are supporting, and generally on edge - I am grateful for the opportunity I have to go and cast my ballot. And, very grateful for parents who expected me to.

The only thing I will change for next time is that I will not vote as early as I did. I have no allegiance to any one person, but I do for certain platforms. And, I may just change my mind as we get closer to election day, and more true colors come out.

2020 - Gratitude Day #1 - My Mom

Today I am grateful for my mom, Ida Stevens Clemens.

It's November 1st. And, it's been a rough year.

Today is my mother's birthday, and if she were alive she would be age 107.  

She had a long and good life, though the early years were clouded by a pandemic, just like ours is today.

Mom was only five years old during the 1918 flu epidemic. She wrote in her journal about a smell of burnt autumn leaves that seemed to fill the air, with a haze following. Soon, people began getting sick. Two of her young brothers would die with the flu, and her mother's sister Harriett would lose three within a month.

Her father built coffins for people. Both my mom and my grandmother got down with the flu and couldn't get out of bed. When she finally felt well she leaned up on one arm to look out the window and down the hill, where she saw many caskets laying in a row. There were bodies in them, but no one was well enough to bury the dead.

In 2017 or 2018, there was a television show on one of the education channels that nearly repeated mom's experience about the flu. I contacted them and told them I had a firsthand account if they would like a copy. Yes! Little did my mom know that her rough little journal would end up on sites that can be viewed around the world.

Mom worked hard. She was the oldest of a large family of boys, and told me I didn't have to be stronger than them - just louder. I fear the boy or man who would think to get into a tussle with her.

I want to focus on something my mom taught me when I was a young girl. My parents served others for as long as I can remember. One day she told me she was going to help someone who had just had surgery, so I was to get my coat and be ready to go. (My parents never left me with anyone. I went everywhere with them.)

We arrived at a woman's house that did not look familiar to me. As we stepped inside, her home was warm and inviting, but mom headed straight back the hall to her bedroom. There laid a large black woman that I didn't know, but mom did. I believe she was a member of our church.

We positioned her and changed her sheets and fluffed her pillows. Mom combed her hair. She was experiencing some gas from the surgery, and mom gave her some ginger ale and told her to lay on her left side, for that helps to release the gas bubbles.

Then, mom told me to trim her fingernails and toenails. I hesitated. She gave me the "look". I trim everyone's nails. As a matter of fact, I trimmed 120 toenails and fingernails every Saturday night when raising my own family. When going on genealogy trips with my sisters they would all line up on the bed with their feet hanging over, just ready for me.

But, I don't think I had ever touched a black person before. It didn't matter. Mom was still giving me the "look".

So, I did. I trimmed them. Filed them. And I rubbed lotion all over her feet and legs. I could look into her face and see how good it felt to her.

Mom and I stopped for coneys and root beer at A&W on the way home, and she told me something I have carried with me to this day. She said I was never to look at someone and make a judgment call because of the color of their skin.

You better be looking at the color of their heart.

So, I am grateful for the mother I was born to so many years ago. I open my mouth, and her words come out. Recently my son told me that when he opens his mouth my words come out.

No, they are the words of generations.

2019 - Gratitude Month #1 - My Mom

Gratitude month #1

It's November. And, it's when I do my daily gratitude posts.

I know it's probably cheesy, and it may be something you just want to scroll on past. But for me, it gives me cause to stop and reflect on what I do have to be thankful for.

And, as in the past I begin the month with gratitude for my mom; Ida Stevens Clemens.

Mom was born 106 years ago today in the back hills of eastern Kentucky. She was the oldest in a large family, and was the only girl. There was a baby sister who died at age three from being "liver growed" (ask me), but Mom held her own with all of her brothers.

She survived the 1918 flu epidemic that took several of her brothers and many of her cousins. Both she and her mom were stricken, but made it through. She recalled leaning up on one elbow to look out the window, only to see row after row of coffins with no one well enough to bury them. She kept a snippet of a journal recalling that terrible time, which I transcribed and sent in to either the History Channel or PBS. (I forget.)

She married my Dad in 1932, who was the middle child in a large family. I asked her what it was like getting married and living in the Great Depression. She said they didn't even know one was going on. They were poor.

Mom, Dad, and my three sisters were living in West Virginia when two missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints knocked on their door. Mom listened to what they had to say, and knew they were offering her much more than what had been in her life. Being a strong woman in 1948, and against the wishes of her husband, Mom and my three sisters were baptized.

I am amazed. She was a "don't mess with me" type of person, and when I came along several years later, I grew up with that same attitude. Weakness was not in her nature, nor my sisters', and certainly not in me.

Mom passed away in 1984, just a few months after her last grandchild was born. Sometimes I am jealous of my sisters, who had her more years than I did. When she died, I was only 29.

I miss her so much, for not a day goes by that I can't think of what she would have done, or what she would have said, or would she just have said nothing at all, and give you "the look".

We all know "the look". If I was naughty at church and happened to see her at the end of the hall, I knew that shortly she would be marching down that hall, her arms pumping and smoke coming from her nostrils. Don't even bother trying to outrun her. She had nine brothers.

I had the Mom that was meant for me to have. And for that, I am grateful.

And, I can hardly wait to see her again...

PS...I constantly get comments about how much I look and act like her. And best of all, think like her. The double photo below is her on the left, and me on the right holding one of our preemie grandsons. When I first saw the one of me, I was trying to recall where Mom was when it was taken. It wasn't her. It was me!

Orphaned for 35 years

I don't know how I've lived 35 years without her.

Mom died on this date in 1984 when I had four young children, and could have used her advice and influence through the years.

She had her first heart attack when she was the age that I am now, and seven years later, after years of heart attacks and strokes, she took her last breath.

Mom was the oldest of a huge family, all boys! Diabetes and cardiovascular disease ran rampant in the family, so she and her youngest brother were the only ones to make it well into adulthood. She always told me you didn't have to be stronger than the boys; just louder.

She was born and raised in the hills of eastern Kentucky, where she met and married my dad. They had two children before moving to West Virginia and having one more. They were all girls.

Mom did the best she could do with what she had. Dad worked in the coal mines, and was the only one in that coal camp to be drafted into World War II; he was sent to Pearl Harbor.

While he was gone, mom became extremely ill with a goiter that wrapped itself around her blood vessels. Back in Kentucky, her father could sense something was wrong, and drove to see how Ida and the girls were doing. He was alarmed at mom's condition, and brought her back to his house, dropped off my sisters, and drove straight to Columbus, where they saved her life. It made for an early release for my dad. (Thanks to Randy W Whited obtaining a copy of dad's Navy file, I learned more about the situation than my sisters did, for they were all young.)

Mom came roaring back with strength, and a few years later when LDS Missionaries knocked on her door, she listened. And, she listened some more. And, some more. In 1948, when many women didn't have the say so that is found today, and against the wishes of my dad, Mom and my three sisters were baptized. (Dad was later baptized, and was Bishop of our local congregation when I was baptized.)

I came along when my parents were practically empty-nesters. She was of menopausal age, but felt something was "off". A doctor visit enlightened her when they told her she had "Cupid's Tumor". All she heard was "tumor", and was ready to faint. When she learned what it really meant, she was truly ready to faint.

I know it probably wasn't easy to secure a crib, rubber pants, and childproof the house, but she did. And I came along, being raised pretty much as an only child by people who were the ages of my friends' grandparents.

She had perfect aim. My sisters reminded me of my dad pulling a fork out of his hip after he had made a smart-aleck remark to my mom in another room. She flicked that fork, and made her statement without ever opening her mouth.

She taught me how to shoot. On one of our many trips to Kentucky, she took me out behind the tobacco barn and set up all kinds of targets. She was hard to satisfy, but I finally passed "her" test.

She took me through the woods on several occasions and taught me about everything I could survive on if I ever became lost. Or, poor.

But, due to her age, her blood pressure, and her heart, she wasn't able to be there to help me when I brought home our babies. One of the hardest days of my life was when Peter was just a few days old, and she told me she had called my dad. He would be coming to pick her up in a couple of hours.

"But, mom!!!! What in the world am I going to do? I've never been around babies. I was the baby!"

She told me I would be fine, and the best thing for her to do would be to let me discover that.

I cried.

Even at the age I am now, I could use her wisdom, and her "pull up your britches" moxie. I remember the times when I would whine about something. She wouldn't lecture me. She just looked at me with one eyebrow raised.

And, I hushed up.

So, she's gone. I miss her more than I can describe. She was born in the day of kerosene lamps, yet lived to see the moon landing.

Because of her, knowledge was instilled in me that I will see her again. She will not be the older woman who raised me, and who became sick. She will be in her prime.

I can't wait.

So, I remember her and honor her today, waiting for the day I can call out, "Mom!", and go running to her, and to Dad, and to Peter.

Ida Stevens Clemens

1 Nov 1913 - 14 Sep 1984

Gratitude Day #2 - 2018 - My Dad

Gratitude Day #2

It would only be fitting that the day following my gratitude post for my mom would be the day I am grateful for my dad.

I miss him.

Dad barely made it out of elementary school in rural Kentucky. Dad went as far as 6th grade, spending three years in 4th grade. Mom went all the way to 8th grade. Yet he and my mom were two of the smartest people I ever knew.

Like his father and his grandfather, they could make anything they wanted with their hands - and no plans. His grandfather could build a house doing the measurements in his head. He would fell the trees nearly to the exact amount needed. Dad made me a wheat grinder by going to the dump and securing a washing machine motor. He built housing around it, ordered two burr stones, bought an extra long funnel, and presented it to me. Mine is better than most will ever own. It's over 30 years old, and still grinds the best flour.

After resisting following my mom and my sisters in joining The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, he finally realized that this was what both he and his family needed to weed out some of the things that were not so good in their lives, and to bring them a bit higher in their aspirations. He made the move to Ohio after learning that the opportunities for education for my sisters were greater.

Dad worked in the coal mines in West Virginia, providing as best he could for my mom and three sisters. While WWII was still raging, he was the only one from the coal camp who was drafted. There were other young men; but it was dad who was taken into the US Navy -- and sent to Pearl Harbor.

Dad served as Bishop of our local congregation, and held that position when he baptized me at age eight. He also worked full time at Westinghouse, and had his own refrigeration/air conditioning business on the side. The latter came from the skills he learned in the Navy.

I had my dad longer than my mom. She died in 1984; dad in 2002.

I had a conversation with a friend today about hands. Yesterday I showed my granddaughter's hands holding onto mine. My mom was always ashamed of her hands, for they looked old and withered. Dad's hands were rough, yet his fingertip pads were smooth - the sign of a hard worker with no fingerprints.

I would love to hold their hands again; to run my own hands over theirs and recall the hard work they performed to provide their whining daughter a good life.

Yes, I am grateful for good, good parents. They raised me when I was born to them in their forties. And, they did the best they could.

Oh, I can't wait to embrace them and thank them like they deserve.

Dad, about the time he was serving as Bishop from 1961-1964.

Dad baptizing me in the Mansfield Chapel

Mom and Dad and Me - 1965

Gratitude Day #1 - 2018 - Remembering Mom on Her 105th Birthday

EDIT: This is the first of my November gratitude posts for November 2018.

Gratitude Day #1

Sigh...

My mom would have been 105 years old if she were alive today. And, sometimes those "would have beens" are the hardest words to utter.

I miss her. I could use her advice daily. I could use her "stand up on your hind legs with your paws in the air" spirit; as well as her genteel kindness.

I could still use her reminders to act like the lady you are. Though a hillbilly woman born in some of the poorest parts of Kentucky, mom had class. You either have it or you don't. She had it. I'm trying to have it.

I could use her sideways glance (cygogglin') to keep me in check; to know when to open my mouth and when to keep it shut.

I could use some of her cooking! Mine will never measure up to what she could throw together with no recipes. How did she DO that? And more importantly, why can't I?

And, I would certainly love to listen to some of her prayers again. There is nothing quite listening to the prayers of our parents; or walking past their room as they're kneeling together praying. Both of my parents prayed and talked with the Lord like He was sitting right in front of them.

Recently I wasn't feeling so well. I wasn't sick. I just didn't feel good. I can still remember the coolness and the calmness of of the touch of her hand on my brow that made everything feel better.

I can still hear her laugh! Her laugh made everyone around her want to laugh!

Mom died at age 71, an age I will reach in a few more years. Each of my sisters were a bit nervous as they reached that age and moved past it.

Some people are around that knew her, and they often say how much I remind them of her. The picture below shows both of us. Can you tell us apart? The one on the right shows me holding my 2 lb 10 oz grandson.

I often close down some of my presentations with the photo of hands below. It is my hand, along with my granddaughter's.

When she touches my hand, she touches history. My mom knew her great-grandfather, who was in the Civil War. He likely knew and touched the hands of a few generations before him.

So it is with us all. History continues on through us; through our looks, our stories, our touch, our work.

Mom, I miss you on this, your 105th birthday. And, I can hardly wait to throw my arms around you again and do some catching up. I need you to tell me all about the people you have met, and why they keep hiding from me.

Ida on left, Peggy and grandson Jayden on right

Peggy and baby Madeline's hands

Swans and painted toenails

This has been a week of things popping up in my feed that remind me of stories and happenings from my past.

First; southern funeral custom. Second; Swans.

My mother recounted that when I was about 2-3 years old, she and my dad packed up food, utensils, and me and drove across town to a church picnic. It was held in a park with a lake full of swans.

Swans can be mean.

My mother had just painted her toenails a bright red, and was wearing sandals. As we ate our picnic food, one of those swans came along and began pecking at her big toes.

It pecked and pecked. Then, it invited its friends.

Those swans chased my mother all over the park, trying to get at her toes. They must have thought they were berries.

She ended up having to eat her lunch in the car. In July. In the sweltering heat.

With a bunch of swans just waiting on her to open the door.

Christmas beauties of the day - red gingham strips, Christmas bows

Christmas beauties of the day.

Red gingham bows.

It was 1963, and I was eight years old. Our Christmas tree was certainly not a decorator's tree. The ornaments were mostly homemade -- like the Christmas card I cut out and put into a cottage cheese lid during the school year.

Mom had an idea, and it has lasted 54 years. She had a yard of red gingham, and she carefully taught me how to use big scissors and cut it into strips. She then taught me how to iron, and I ironed all of those strips -- several dozen in all.

We tied those on to the tree, and all of a sudden it became very festive!

Those strips of red gingham have followed me for 54 years -- from when I grew up here in Mansfield, to when I moved to Akron at age 18, to when I moved to the Washington, DC area in 1977 and met and married Kerry, and back to Mansfield in 1979.

They are not fancy, by any means. But, they have been on every tree I've ever had in 54 years. As I was ironing them, I could tell my childhood cuts from my mother's experienced ones.

And, I shed a few tears in memory...

Gratitude Day #25 - My Teachers - 25 Nov 2017

Today I am grateful for my teachers.

And, I have had SO many of them!!

I can still recall the feelings of a scared six-year old girl entering first grade. I hadn't gone to kindergarten, because they told my parents I didn't need to go. (Harumph!)

But, I sweet, large-bosomed woman with bat-wings for arms swept me into her arms, told me how happy she was to meet me, and my fears went away. She started my love of life-long learning that continues to this day.

Years later, after being wheeled to my semi-private room following surgery, I heard this sweet voice through the curtain saying, "Peggy? Little Peggy? Is that you?"

It was Mrs. Boone! My first-grade teacher and I were roommates!! After all of the thousands of students she had taught in the 24 years since I was in her classroom, she remembered ME!

My schoolteachers filled my sponge-like mind with things that I use even to this day. My piano teacher taught my fingers to fly! My church teachers helped to instill a love of God that filled my spiritual soul, and still do to this day.

And once, when I was in my early thirties, I wrote thank you notes to every, single one of my school teachers and my church teachers that had to put up with me in my youth. I let them know they had indeed made a difference in my life, and that I use the knowledge and techniques they filled my mind with.

Speakers at genealogy conferences and on webinars open up new avenues I would never have thought of. The ones I admired from afar for so many years are my colleagues today. I never, EVER expected that to happen.

I only took one college class in my life. When I worked at the University of Akron, I was permitted to take any classes I wanted for free. Not having a lot of confidence at the time, I took a class on how to play the harmonica from a man who used to play with Freddie and the Fendercats.

I wish I had taken more.

I place my parents at the top of the list, for they taught without teaching. All I had to do was look at their example, and recognize this was something I needed to know. Sometimes I used to get weary when my kids would say, "Well, mom...you never taught me that." Well, open your eyes and learn like the rest of us do.

Let me tell you about my uneducated mom.

Mom had a keen eye. She taught me how to shoot. She took me out behind the tobacco barn, set up several targets, and wouldn't turn me loose until I satisfied her. Later, while qualifying for my CCW, my instructor was astounded at how I could blow away the center of a target every single time. He asked me who in the world taught me how to shoot.

My Kentucky mama. Enough said.

But, let me tell you an even more important time when she taught me. Over the course of several years, she would take me through the woods, showing me different things I could survive on if I ever became lost. She also taught me things to stay away from.

And, she warned me that if I were ever walking along and suddenly the smell of a cucumber or a muskmelon seemed to be in the air...beware! Why? She told me it would be a copperhead masking its scent.

Yeah, right.

About 2-3 years after that, she once again had me up the holler behind her parents house. I guess I was trying to pay attention, but not close enough.

I seemed to notice a scent in the air that smelled unfamiliar, and turned around to say something to her. She fastened her eyes on me with the "look", and without saying a word, pointed her gaze to the ground.

It was a copperhead!!! And, it was coiled. I knew I was dead.

Now, let me point out that my mom would walk with a bonnet or sunhat on her head, a walking stick, and an apron. In the pocket of the apron, she carried a few rocks.

Seemingly without making a move, she reached down into the pocket of that apron, took a stone, flicked it, and totally decapitated that snake!

I was a blithering idiot. But, I never mocked her again. That woman knew her stuff!

Mom had a lot of wise words that I find myself saying today. She once told me:

"You will learn something from every person you run across.

You may learn a better way of doing things.

Or, you may learn a way to never do something.

Either way, you will learn."

Mother speaks.

So, for all of my teachers in my life, I thank you. You have enriched my life and made it fuller. I have learned things I didn't know that I didn't know.

Dad and Mom were master gardeners, whose flowers and vegetables would cause people to stop at the house just to look.

Mom usually wore a sunhat or a bonnet.

Mom's bonnet is on the right.