Happy Mothers Day

Regrettably, I lost my mother when I was but a young lad (monkey) but I am forever grateful for the time I had with her and that I got my politics, my sense of humor, and my sweet tooth from her.

She taught us kids, there were five of us and I was the last of the lot, not to look up to and idolize rich white men who used their positions to line their pockets, but instead to choose people who gave something back to the world as our heroes. In our home in the projects of Detroit in the late 60's/early 70's she taught us to look up to people like JFK, RFK, Martin Luther King, the Berrigan brothers, and because she loved Big Ten football, Bo Schembechler.

Two of my favorite memories of her are as follows:

• One Friday night the electric company came to shut off our electricity because we were so far behind in paying it due to the fact that Mom did not work outside the home due to her heart condition and Dad was not working because he was in and out of the mental hospital. My grandparents came and picked us all up and took us to their house for a hot meal and then they drove us all home. We kids filed out of the car and stood waiting on the stoop for Mom. Mom got out of Grandpa's car and Grandma stuck her head out and said to us kids, "You kids go inside and get ready for bed and don't worry, we'll get the power turned back on on Monday." Mom said, "Thanks for supper Mom, goodnight," and she waved goodbye to her parents as they drove off. After they turned the corner and were out of sight Mom said to my oldest brother Charlie, "Screw Monday, Charlie go inside and get me the pliers." A second later Charlie came back out with a pair of pliers and gave them to Mom. She then proceeded to twist off the flimsy wire closure on the outside breaker box, opened the box, and turned our power back on. We all cheered when we saw the lights come on. Mom smiled and said, "Don't let me ever catch any of you doing something like that."
• I was eight years old and that meant my eldest brother was thirteen so Mom decided that it was time that we learned the truth about where babies came from and how they were made. She sat us kids down at the kitchen table and began her talk. "Inside every woman are eggs..." I remember thinking, "Hold on there, they have eggs inside them? Ewwww." My eight year old brain was gripped by the thought of those eggs. I wanted to know more about them and possibly to see them. You need to understand that we were poor back then, we lived on welfare, AFDC, and got Medicaid, in short my family was one of the ones the Republicans used to rail against when they bitched about all those social programs that LBJ and the Congressional Democrats in the 1960's started, you know like Head Start, Medicaid, Food Stamps, etc. Sometimes near the end of the month when all the Food Stamps had been used and we were waiting on the next months stamps to come in, food in our house was scarce and it was around the end of the month when Mom was giving us the "sex talk," and that was why those eggs inside women captured my imagination. Mom continued to prattle on about what went where when married people "did the deed." Finally I could not take it anymore, something had to give, and I said, "Lets go back to those eggs. You said all women have eggs inside them, well, here we are going hungry and you guys," I pointed at my Mom and my two sisters, "are hoarding eggs. That's not fair. I want some eggs." Mom began to laugh, and when she finally stopped laughing she explained to me about the type of eggs inside women. It was quite a while after that before she could make scrambled eggs for us for breakfast without cracking up.

And I know she'd approve of this, so go check it out.