When my mother told me my sister Louise wasn’t well enough to come to Virginia for Thanksgiving, I vowed to find a way to be with her instead. I was a college student and didn't have a car, so I stood up at church during the service and asked if anyone could give me a ride to New Jersey. After the service, two or three people offered to help me.

I’m ashamed I don’t remember the name of the family that turned out to be the answer to my prayers, but I have never forgotten their kindness. They packed me and my suitcase into their overcrowded car for the trip north, wedged in the back with their two children. They were warm and welcoming but blessed me by not asking too many questions about my sister's cancer. I wanted to be alone with my thoughts.

When I finally made it to Sis's home, I was utterly shocked. Nothing had prepared me for her appearance and condition. She looked like she’d stepped out of a concentration camp, her skin ashen, her face skeletal and misshapen, her head covered with tufts of fine hair that she usually hid under a wig, her remaining eye unfocused and unsettled in her eye socket.

She could still walk and get around a bit, but she could never stay comfortable for long. The cancer was in her spine and the pain was always with her.

I didn’t know what to do or what to say. At 19, I was too young to know the rituals of the sick and dying; I felt ill equipped to face the magnitude of her suffering and loss. Mercifully the years have erased some of the most painful memories, though the ones that remain haunt me.

While I was in New Jersey, my mother celebrated Thanksgiving with the family on the farm in Virginia. December must have been a blur for her, as she didn't write me any letters.

Then it was Christmas. I know my brother Steve went up to New Jersey--did she and my father go too? I have no memory of where I was or what I did. Did I go to Oklahoma to be with Eric? Or did we spend Christmas with his family in Florida? Or did I spend Christmas in Virginia with my family? I don't know.

My next letter from my mother is dated January 20th. I must have thanked her again for my Christmas gifts:

I'm glad you liked all your gifts Veronica--I tried to do my best--my heart just wasn't in the holidays at all. I hope you like your birthday gift--it's not very practical but I thought it was so feminine...We've had absolutely miserable weather--extremely cold again--yesterday freezing rain all day--the sun is out today but more freezing rain tonight and tomorrow. Can't believe it--just hope it clears u for the weekend--We must get up to see Sis---

Must close--take care of yourself Veronica--be careful running that you don't slip and fall--also wearing those boots [my cowboy boots]--be careful--Our love to Vicky--We love you too Veronica--

Love always,

Mom + Dad

Then on January 26:

I tried calling you Sun. night after 11:00 but the line was busy so I gave up and went to bed--dad and I were so tired after that week-end trip. the weather was just awful. When we left Friday afternoon it was snowing and all the way up on and off it snowed. Tom [my oldest brother] did all the driving. . We arrived at Sis's at 2:15 a.m [Saturday morning] + got home here around 5:00 Sun. Our driveway was a sheet of ice. Tom put the chains on his van and drove me to the door--it was awful--at least the suns out today and I hope it melts a little--had more snow on it yesterday.

Sis is really slipping fast--it was just so sad Veronica--She mentioned your name several times and I told her you were back in school and told her about your grades. We sat with her as much as we could--Her sight is completely gone and she is very weak. All we can do is pray for her. It is a devastating disease.

Even in the aftermath of what was a heart-rending visit to my sister, she cares enough about me to once again warn me about not slipping on all the ice. She closed her letter, which was tucked in a card, with a birthday wish:

Have a nice birthday Veronica. I'll try and call you this weekend again. God bless you--dad and I love you--

Love,

Mom

My birthday was four days later, falling on a Saturday, and I managed to get a ride home from college for the weekend.

Saturday morning. I remember going running. My parents waving to me as they passed me in the car. Later, I was back at the house when the phone rang. I answered it. It was Sis's husband, Jim, calling to tell us she had died.

I don't remember my own reaction as vividly as I remember my mother's. She screamed like a banshee, like her heart had been ripped out of her chest, like she'd received a tremendous shock. Now that I'm a mother, I know her heart had indeed been torn from her chest and that up until the moment Sis died, my mother was still clinging to hope for a miracle. I remember my father taking her in his arms while she wailed in the kitchen. I also remember the men in the family sitting around the kitchen table drinking whiskey in the late afternoon, and later that night, we ate my birthday cake.  

To this day, I'm stunned by the cruelty of this twist of fate: my parents lost their oldest daughter on their youngest daughter's birthday. 

Copyright 2013 Veronica McCabe Deschambault. Do not cut, copy, paste.

My parents lived in Virginia, along with my brothers Tom [father of four] and Steve [a graduate student]. My sister Mary Jane her family were living in Maine. My sister Eileen was at home in Georgia with her husband and newborn son. I was at college in Virginia, about 3 hours away from my parents.

Looks like we'll be leaving for Sis's late Friday night. Tom is coming up with us. He + dad will come back home Sun. afternoon. I'll stay for awhile. When I leave MaryJane will come down so she'll always have someone there.

Sunday night she wrote:

Well here I am at Sissy's. We arrived here yesterday morning (Sat.) after driving all night. Dad + Tom left for Virginia this morning--they should be arriving home shortly and I'm sure they'll call--

Veronica--I'll tell you--Sis has lost so much weight and is so weak. I think the fact that she's been in bed so long would make her weak too. She's had so many problems with her mouth that it's so hard for her to eat even after food has been blended. With the help of God it should get better. She did get a lot of liquids today and had some ice cream etc.--we'll see how she does tomorrow...I don't know how long I'll be here. I am hoping to get home for Thanksgiving--We'll see--I'm so sorry that I won't see Eric but it's so important for me to be here. She is just so happy to have me here.

On Tuesday:

We are doing okay here. Sis has good and bad days. Last night around 11:00 she got a throw-up + diarrhea virus--just can't believe it--she felt so sick but seems to be better this morning--she is still in bed. This Friday she goes in for her chemo treatment. Will have to stay in overnight--all we can do is pray--it's just so sad.

I cannot tell you how happy she was to get your letter and the beautiful flowers. It made her so happy. The flowers are the most beautiful bouquet she ever received--carnations and roses--even Jimmy said it.

Wednesday:

A real quick note. I'm sitting here waiting for Sis to come down to breakfast. Thank God she is feeling a little stronger but is still so weak. All the medications and treatment have really taken their toll. Yesterday was a beautiful day so I did get her outside a bit. We must all keep praying for her. I'm so happy I'm here with her. Her days would be so long being here alone because her vision is blurry and she is unable to read or crochet so it really makes it hard. If she is well enough they are hoping to take me home the week-end before Thanksgving so we'll all be together. Between MaryJane + I we are going to try and be with her this winter--we'll take turns--MaryJane has the children and I know it's hard for her. We'll see.

Meanwhile, back in Virginia, I was ironing out wedding details. In the pre-Internet age, everything was done in person, not online, not over the phone. Eric had come up for a visit from Oklahoma, and we'd reserved space for the wedding reception, talked to a caterer, ordered a cake and flowers. It should have been a happy time; instead, it felt unreal.

With Sis being so sick, all the things that had once been so important to me felt insignificant. I was planning my future while she was struggling to get through each day. What was I doing? What did any of it mean?

I felt vulnerable and sought strength and comfort in Christian organizations on campus and the small church I was attending. I read the Bible and prayed daily. I tried to come to terms with my sister's cancer as some of the evangelicals I spent time with me spoke to me of faith-based miracles and healings. What did I believe?

Trying to reconcile born-again theology with the Catholic teachings of my childhood and the reality of what was happening in front of my eyes kept me awake at night. Faith and Doubt and Hope kept watch with me in my dark hours. Joy was often squelched by latent feelings of guilt. How could I enjoy anything while Sis enjoyed nothing?

I dealt with the stress by throwing myself into my academic work and my running. That fall, I often ran ten miles a day, and I developed an unhealthy preoccupation with my weight. I was 5 feet 7.5 inches tall and my normal weight during my teen years was 120-125 pounds. I was naturally thin, with the long arms and legs of a distance runner, but despite this, I began counting calories and weighing myself daily, trying to get thinner.

Looking back on that time now, I think some of the same characteristics that made me push myself academically and athletically made me vulnerable to the subculture of weight obsession that existed on campus. The perfect weight became another thing to chase, like a perfect test score, a 4.0 GPA, or a first place finish. Those goals and accomplishments made my life feel more solid than it really was and were a diversion from the complexities of faith and theology and the rawness of my pain. Maybe there was also an element of penitence at work too, a subconscious belief that denying myself food would add weight to my prayers for healing. Or a feeling that if I made myself suffer in small ways, I would lessen the gap between my life and Sis's.

Regardless of my motivations, my mother, writing from Sis's house in New Jersey, was concerned about all the ways I restricted my food intake and choices:

I hope you're doing okay--How did you do in your exams? I hope you are eating good--don't forget you need protein--like meat, cheese + eggs--it's important to eat balanced meals.

And later:

I spoke to Dad yesterday. He seems to be doing okay even tho I know he has a lot of work to do and I feel bad that I am not there to help him. It was really nice of Eric to help him. He told me all the good food he cooked over the week-end. I hope you ate some Veronica--I'm sure Eric enjoyed it--speaking of food Veronica, please eat well. I get concerned about that diet of yours--don't skip meals--I wouldn't want you to get sick.

My poor mother. She shouldn't have had to worry about me on top of everything else, but she did. She was looking out for me, was I looking out for her?

Everyone in my family was struggling with the desire to be present for my sister, present for each other, and present in their own lives/families. Life was moving fast, joy and sorrow pulling us in opposing directions, stretching us thin.

At 19, I had never grappled with so many life-changing events and Big Issues at once. I wasn't sure where I belonged--with my sister in New Jersey? at college in Virginia? with my parents and brothers on the farm? with Eric in Oklahoma?

I wanted to believe God had a plan for me, that I would be able to discern His will, that everything would work out for the good. I wanted to let go of a worldly perspective and focus on a heavenly one, to be still, to practice acceptance, to let go of my expectations and trust God. Sometimes I found peace and sometimes peace found me. However, despite my faith, I often felt that no matter where I was, I should be somewhere else. No matter what I did, it wasn't enough.  

(This post is part of a series and larger project. Read about its beginning here.)

My mother was busy in September, helping out with her first grandsons: my nephew Joe, born to my sister in Atlanta in late August, and now James, born to my brother and his wife in late September. My brother Tom and his wife and three daughters lived in a house on the back side of our family's farm and saw my parents daily. They were surprised and excited to welcome a boy into the family after three girls. From  her letter of September 30, 1981:

We're all sitting on cloud 9 since that new grandson arrived--you should see him Veronica--He is so big--We went to visit Darcy last night and I held the baby--he is beautiful--certainly doesn't look like an infant. He has a real chubby face--double chin and beautiful brown hair--9 lbs 3 oz and 22 1/2 in. long--the largest baby in the nursery. Darcy hopes to get home Thursday.

 My semester was rolling along and fall break was coming.

Can't wait for you to get home--incidentally, how are you getting home?? We'll have so much to talk about and discuss but I'm sure you and Eric have the wedding planned. We'll talk about it when you get home.

The wedding was five months away. I know it's not uncommon for brides to spend a year or more preparing for their weddings--from the wedding dress and bridesmaid attire to the venue and ceremony, guest lists and invitations, food and music, guest accommodations, flowers and decorations and all the personal touches.

I was not one of those brides.

If I hadn't wanted a religious ceremony in a church, I probably would have eloped. All my siblings had had big weddings, and yes, they had been fun. But for me, the ceremony was important, the rest of the wedding hoopla was not. In the end, I made nearly all the decisions and arrangements for my wedding in a weekend. My goals was to keep it small and keep it simple. That was a reflection of who I was and the circumstances I was facing at the time.

My sister Louise (aka Sis) was battling cancer and as a result, much of what was going on in my life seemed superficial in comparison. My relationships with my family, my closest friends, and Eric mattered to me. Everything else fell away.

In the September 30 letter that focused on my new nephew, my wedding, and the farm, there was a sad disjointed postscript:

I know Veronica that you do write to Sis--but keep writing often--she just isn't doing too well--even if it's just cards + a few lines.  Dad + I are planning to go up the end of this month--She is a little better then she had been--that chemo therapy really wiped her out. She is off it right now.

Reading it now, I realize my mother was telling me my sister was dying. I remember getting this letter at college and immediately walking off campus and heading downtown in search of a florist. Despite my scant financial resources, I wanted to send Louise flowers.

She had sinus cancer and the initial surgery to treat it had cost her an eye, half her upper teeth, and part of her palate. As the cancer progressed, she began losing vision in her remaining eye.

As I placed my order, I explained to the florist that my sister was partially blind, so I wanted the flower arrangement to be bold and colorful, to take advantage of whatever she could still see. I also requested that the flowers be fragrant, so that if she couldn't see them, she could at least smell them.

Later, I remember talking to Eric on the phone, crying hard while telling him about the flowers, about how I asked that they smell wonderful. How could I forget, I sobbed. How could I forget that Louise couldn't smell anything? That losing her sense of smell (and taste) had been one of the first brutal effects of her cancer.

It was all too much to bear. More than anything, I wanted to do something kind for my sister, make some small difference in her day. I couldn't even send her flowers or chocolates or do anything but write her letters saying, "I'm thinking of you. I care. I am so sorry this is happening."

(This post is part of a series and larger project. Read about its beginning here.)

My mother's letter on August 5 asked me for all the information about my flight home from Oklahoma to Virginia and when exactly I was starting classes. Her next letter was written on September 1, arrived in my college mailbox, postmarked from Atlanta, where my sister Eileen lived with her husband Joe. Her first baby had arrived on August 21:

The baby is really cute--very light but looks just like Joe--he is a good baby--Eileen is feeling better with each passing day--baby must be fed every 3 hrs. so she does have to rest while he is sleeping. We haven't decided when we'll go home--we'll see. It is a long ride--took 11 1/2 hrs. but mostly inter-state so wasn't too bad.

It was my parents' first visit to Georgia. Eileen and Joe had moved there in the spring, and my mother loved their big brick colonial house, surrounded by trees.

September 15:

We really had a great time at Eileen's--it was a real vacation for us--Their home is just beautiful and the baby is so cute--wait till you see him--

We never went on vacations when I was a kid. Ever. My parents always loved visiting my various sisters, who lived in Maine, New Jersey, and Atlanta. When they were home, they worked hard on the farm and the house from the time they got up until after dinner.  When my parents went to visit my older siblings, it was a luxury to wake up and not face an endless list of chores. Plus all of my sisters and their husbands went out of their way to make my parents' visits something special. They liked to spoil them and treat them to foods, conveniences, and small luxuries that my parents had spent their whole lives living without.

My sisters often spoiled me too. I was the "baby" in the family, and they all looked after me in their own ways. When I was teenager, this often translated into giving me clothes--sometimes hand-me-downs, sometimes brand new items they found on sale. My sisters shopped at Macy's and New York department stores and bought things that were better quality and more fashionable than what I normally had in my closet. Their generosity and good taste meant I always had some outfits to feel good about. Even as Eileen recovered from giving birth and adjusted to motherhood, she still was looking out for me:

Besides the two skirts, she also sent you a couple of blouses--also a box of household odds + ends--some dishes, serving bowls, pictures, etc--I'm sure you'll be able to use them.

Meanwhile, my parents were helping my brother Stephen, who had just moved out of the house and started graduate school at the University of Virginia:

We were happy to have Stephen home this past week-end--dad gave him a box of fresh vegetables which I'm sure they [Steve and his roommates] can use--He also did their laundry here--that saved them about $6--don't know if he told you but he did get a job in the law library--I'm glad because he sure can use the money. 

My mother had other good news to share. She and my father had a new car. Emphasis on new because I believe this was the first new car my parents had ever owned. In their 35+ years together, they had always bought used cars and driven them until they couldn't be driven anymore. After years of driving a banged up Ford Maverick with a broken door, dents, and lots of rust, my folks finally had a reliable, attractive car--a Ford Escort wagon.

Dad + I are so happy with the new car--It is such a pleasure riding in it--made a big difference on our trip to Georgia. He kept track of the mileage and got 35 mi. per gal. of gas which is great--

All the good news in this letter was shadowed by the dark cloud we couldn't escape--my sister Louise's battle with sinus cancer. My mother closed her letter with this:

please pray for Sis and write to her often--she is having problems with the irritation in her mouth again--she is in a lot of pain--

The "irritation" in her mouth were ulcerations brought on by chemotherapy and maybe the cancer itself. If you've ever marvelled over how a single canker sore or injury in your mouth can cause so much misery, imagine that pain magnifed many times over.

I wrote to Louise often and she wrote to me. I have every letter she ever sent me in a wicker hamper in my bedroom. I have never re-read them. One day soon I'll find the courage to unfold those sheets of stationery, read my sister's words, remember her life and advice, and hear her voice again.

(This post is part of a series and larger project. Read about its beginning here.)

The letters I'm reading now are from the early 1980s and contain so many reminders of what life was like in the "old days," before personal computers, the Internet, cell phones, and voice mail changed everything.

My mom was trying to schedule a dentist appointment for me and had so much difficulty:

I called Dr. Caporal and there was no answer--finally yesterday I called again and a girl who was doing some work in the office said he is on vacation. She gave me the home no. of the receptionist and I tried calling her but no answer--I'll keep trying.

This was the business world in the Reagan administration. It's easy to forget that I came of age in a world without answering machines or voice mail, where calls didn't get forwarded or roll over onto another line, where pre-recorded messages weren't left when someone was out of the office.

My mother had to make multiple phone calls to get my appointment set up. It took days. Hard to believe, isn't it?

This was also back when AT&T had a monopoly on long distance phone service. Long distance phone calls were a significant expense, and so budget-minded folks and even the middle class limited their long distance calling and the time spent on the call.

I'm sorry I couldn't talk to you longer on the phone but Stephen [my brother] had been on so long and I didn't want to run that bill up because it does add up fast--

(I remember when I was in my 20s and living far from home, I called home once a week and once a month I'd treat myself to a long distance call to a friend or one of my siblings. Once a month!)

In July 1981, I was getting ready to return to college in late August, and my semester fees were due:

We received your tuition bill. Please send me a check for $842 as soon as you receive this letter. If not pd on time there is a late fee of $75-

$842 for a semester's tuition to a state university? Wow.

As I write this, I'm bracing myself for the cost of sending my son to a state school. Tuition is about $7,000 a year, $3,500/semester. Maybe years from now my son will read that number and be shocked how low it is. Right now the cost of college feels somewhat overwhelming.

I paid most of my own college costs, but my mother had been shopping the sales for notebooks, pens, and paper and helping me get ready for school: 

Wards have their running shoes on sale--$17 ones for $10 so I'm going to get you a pair.

I was a big distance runner at the time, and today my daughter is one. I won't tell you how much her running shoes cost. I can't even wrap my brain around my mother getting me running shoes for $17 or $10.

On my supply list was a typewriter, a surprisingly big ticket item that my older sister was going to try and help me with:

I had mentioned to Sis that you needed a typewriter and asked her to price them thru Jim's catalogue [her husband's office supply catalog]. She called last night--the electric ones cost almost $500--with his [corporate] discount it would come to about $247 which is a lot of money. They have a good manual portable one that they'll give to you free--I would take it--it would do the job.

$500 for an electric typewriter? Really? I guess electric typewriters in the early 80s were like Macbooks today.

I did end up taking the free manual typewriter from Sis and Jim, and still remember the misery of using it. Today, I type every day, all the time. Back then I only typed when I had a paper due, and I was not a skilled typist.

Plus, the keys were heavy, sticky, and slow. Every mistake required the neat and careful application of Wite-Out correction fluid, the repositioning of the paper, and re-typing when the Wite-Out was dry. The carriage had to be manually returned after you figured out which word would be the last one that would fit on the line. Centering titles and page numbers required making calculations and was done manually, based on the number of keystrokes and whether you were typing in "pica" or "elite." Superscripts, footnotes, and endnotes were so much work. Calculating margins and page breaks was hard. Then there was changing the ribbon...I detested everything about typing on a typewriter.

When I finally got an electric typewriter (with a built-in correction ribbon!), I was so excited. And when I first used a personal computer with word processing software, it changed my life. It was so easy to write, correct, edit, revise! There was no excuse for poor writing (or typing) once the PC came along, and the first time I hit print and saw my work emerge flawlessly from the printer across the room, it was MAGIC. I still remember that sense of exhilaration.

Today I take so much of this for granted. I'll hit "publish" on this post and it will be available instantaneously all over the world, and my mother's words, written more than 30 years ago with a Bic pen on paper stationery will be available globally.

I wonder what she'd think of that! 

(This post is part of a series and larger project. Read about its beginning here.)

When I was growing up in Virginia, no one had air conditioning. We lived in the mountains and temperatures would drop at night, but no matter where you are in the South, summers are hot and steamy. My mother mentioned the weather frequently:

The heat here this past week was just unbearable--very hot + humid. Thank God--after some thundershowers yesterday afternoon--it has cooled off--at least it's not humid.

And the next week:

We had five of Steve's friends over Sun--two stayed over-night and left early yesterday morning. I made all kinds of salads and had hotdogs, coldcuts-iced tea etc because it's just too hot to sit + eat a hot meal. The humidity here is awful.

The gigantic lawn (former cow pasture) was green and growing fast, and my parents' garden was thriving in the muggy weather:

Despite our weedy garden--it looks like we're going to have a good harvest. The sink right now is full of swiss chard--washed and ready to put up in the freezer--Also put up a few containers of rhubarb--first time I've done it but they say it can be done.

A week later she wrote:

The garden is really taking off--put up 10 pts of beans in the freezer--Have more to pick--I'm giving them to Darcy--We're sharing our garden with her this year--She didn't put any in--the soil is rather poor up there.

My sister-in-law Darcy was pregnant, due in September, so I'm sure that factored into her decision not to have a garden that year. My sister Eileen was also pregnant and due in September, and as the summer hit its peak, my mother increasingly worried about being able to help both of them when the time came and still manage everything else:

Spoke to Eileen yesterday--She was asking for you--She said she is getting so huge--Dr. told her she is going to have a big baby--I just hope it comes on time so I can get back to be with Darcy.

I hope you come home the beginning of August so at least we'll spend some time together. With Eileen's baby due around Sept 4th it may just come early and I won't see you at all--We have a lot to talk over--the wedding etc.

The wedding! Somewhere during this time frame, I had decided to get married a year earlier than initially planned. (If I dug through my old journals, I'd discover when that was.) My fiance Eric was a military college grad and serving in the Army in Oklahoma. The plan had always been for us to marry after he completed his military service, which would have been the summer between my junior and senior years of college. We'd live in northern Virginia while I finished my last year of school. We'd be about 3.5 hours away from my family and a day's drive away from his.

Reading my mother's letters from this time period, I'm surprised almost no discussion is given to what amounted to a major change in plans. I was 19 years old, a straight A student with substantial scholarships planning to leave college early and move to Oklahoma. This, by any rational measure, was not a good idea in terms of my education and its cost. Sure I had a Plan B for how I would complete my degree, but still, this was not a Smart Move! Why did I do it?

There were three things influencing my decision, the first being that despite my academic success, I struggled dealing with stress in college. I put a lot of pressure on myself to do well. The noise and clamor of campus life were hard for me to cope with after years of living in quiet, pastoral rural Virginia. My sister was seriously ill, I had a fiance who was a 1,000 miles away, and I felt isolated by those circumstances and sometimes lapsed into depression. Considering how overwhelmed I felt by school, I could see why marrying Eric early appealed to me. When I was with him, I felt so much stronger.

The second reason was tied to my sister Louise (aka Sis). I was 16 when she was diagnosed with cancer. Like most teenagers, I expected my life to unfold in a neat and predictable set of benchmarks. High school, college, job, marriage, kids--a happily-ever-after that would continue until I died in my own bed at a ripe old age. When Louise was stricken with a rare form of cancer, all my confidence in the future crumbled. Cancer was not supposed to happen to young, beautiful women in their 20s. If it happened to her, it could happen to me. It could happen to anybody. It could happen to Eric. Suddenly, finishing school seemed less important than being with him. If I only had 10 years of my life left, how much of that time would I want to spend alone with my books in the library? 

Finally, Eric was older than me. While I was just starting college, he'd already finished and was settled down, living in a house on a lake, planting a vegetable garden, volunteering with the Boy Scouts, playing in community sports leagues, going to church, joining Toastmasters and all these other organizations. He had never been a college party person and had jumped into Adult Life with both feet. He was crazy about me and single-minded in his desire for me to be happy and us to be together and married, sooner rather than later. Both of us thought moving up our wedding date was the thing to do and it seems now no one tried to talk us out of it.

So now my mom had even more on her plate: the pending arrival of two grandbabies, my unexpected and upcoming wedding, my brother Steve's impending move to graduate school, and my sister's ongoing battle with cancer.

When I was a kid, I thought my parents had a quiet and uneventful life. In retrospect, I see how far from the truth that was. Things were never as calm and peaceful as I imagined they were at home.

(This post is part of a series and larger project. Read about its beginning here.)

All these years later, my mother's letter detailing her Fourth of July holidays makes me homesick for a time and place that exist only in memory. Her words perfectly capture the flavor of that era in my family's life.

My family had split geographically when I was in sixth grade and half the family went South and my older sisters stayed up North. At the time I graduated from high school and left home, my parents and my two older brothers, Tom and Steve, all lived on the farm in Virginia. Tom and his wife, Darcy, and their three girls lived in a house three quarters of a mile from the main road, near the back of the farm, at the foot of Jump Mountain. My parents and Steve and I lived in a house on the front edge of the farm, close to the road. The two houses were built in the same time period by my father and brothers with help from me, my mom, and Darcy. We saw each other nearly every day, and my nieces were like little sisters to me.

My real sisters, Louise (a.k.a Sis), Mary Jane, and Eileen had stayed behind in New York when the rest of the family moved South. Louise and Eileen shared a condo in New York for years and then both married the same summer. I was close to my brothers but as a teen missed having my older sisters around to dispense advice on fashion and dating. My mother missed "the girls" too. Whenever my sisters came to visit us on the farm in Virginia, it was an eagerly anticipated event, one of the highlights of the year.

In the summer of 1981, my siblings and I were more scattered than ever. I was between semesters in college and staying with my fiance, Eric, in Oklahoma. Steve was on the verge of leaving the farm and moving to Charlottesville for graduate school that fall. Tom and Darcy were happily settled into their house and expecting their fourth child. Louise and her husband, Jim, were living in New Jersey and Mary Jane and her family were in Maine. Eileen and her husband, Joe, had just moved from New York to Atlanta and were expecting their first child in August.

Everyone had gotten together for Easter, a family gathering I'd missed, staying at school to finish papers and study for my final exams. A thousand miles away, I also missed the Fourth of July festivities. If I'd known what would happen to all of us, I would have made the trip. I was young, in love, focused on the future, not considering that the world I left behind on the farm in Virginia wouldn't be there forever.

But on Fourth of July 1981, everything was exactly as I'd left it back home:

Louise + Jim arrived here Tues around 4:30--with the dog--Brandy--he was so good and really did fine in the car--boy--what treatment he gets--like Shiloh [our dog that summer in Oklahoma]--at 4 months he is house-broken and well trained.

Brandy was the golden retriever pup that Jim had talked my sister Louise into getting. My family wasn't into pets. Oh sure, we had an occasional cat or dog, but they were always kept outdoors, rarely, if ever, allowed in the house, certainly not considered part of the family. Pets weren't pampered or even taken to the vet--they were fed and watered and petted but mostly lived liked livestock. Brandy, on the other hand, was Louise and Jim's "baby," kept indoors, spoken to, groomed, and doted on. This is why my mother wrote about how they fussed over the dog and noted later in her letter how upset Jim would get when Brandy picked up ticks while walking on the farm. I'm sure she was also surprised they traveled with the dog, something we'd never done.

My mom was charmed by Brandy and glad she was there. Sis had been receiving treatment for sinus cancer for three years. Earlier in the year, my mother had spent six weeks with her and Jim in New Jersey.

[The dog Brandy] is a blessing for Sis--really good company for her. Incidentally--she looks great--lost some of that weight after the doctors took her off medication--that's what was causing it. She still gets chemo-therapy--side effects of that is irritation in her mouth and it's so hard for her to eat--meat etc. must go thru the blender--but she manages somehow.

Dear God, my poor sister. The "irritations" in her mouth were really mouth ulcers and canker sores. It must have been hell. She was small, dark-haired, and petite. Her treatments had caused bloating and weight gain, leaving her with an unnaturally puffy shape and forcing her to buy new clothes. This is why my mother was happy to see the weight loss; it made my sister look like herself again. To see her close to her normal weight made it possible for my mother to believe the medications were working, that she'd be better soon. We were a family of optimists, used to making the best of things:

We really had a nice time even tho the weather has been awful--it's been showering on and off every day. Jim managed to play golf twice in-between the showers which he really enjoyed--also went to a movie with Steve so all in all they had a great time. Tom, Darcy + the children were here often--one night dad made pizza's [sic] and boy--were they good--we really stuffed ourselves.

My dad's homemade pizzas were legendary. When we lived in New York, he was a volunteer firefighter and would cook for all the guys at the firehouse. Pizza was one of his many specialties. Today it strikes me as funny that it was my Irish father, not my Italian mother, who made the pizzas in our house. After I left home, I made many homemade pizzas over the years but nothing I ever conjured in the kitchen came close to what my father made. I have one of his original pizza pans but these days it mostly serves up frozen store-bought pizzas, something that never crossed the threshold of my parents' kitchen when I was young.

As was family tradition, there was picnic for July Fourth.

Last night we ate at Tom's--indoor picnic because it was raining--homemade ice cream, hot dogs etc--saw some of the latest slides--really nice.

The slides! My parents and my brother had their film developed and made into slides. I have no idea why--the aesthetics? a lower cost? Whatever the reason, family slideshows were something I always loved when I lived at home. The old Kodak projector would come out, a sheet would be hung or a wall cleared, chairs would be pulled together, little kids would pile up on the floor, and we'd all watch a slide show. I can still see the projector with dust motes dancing in its beam and hear the fan that kept it from overheating, the satisfying turn-click of the slide carousel, and the exclamations over the larger-than-life images on the screen.

My mom was sure to let me know I was missed at the gathering:

Don't you ever think the kids don't talk about you--especially Melanie and little Kate--if you ask her where is Aunt Veronica  she says Oklahoma as clear as could be--she is so smart--talks so well for 2 years old--They are all getting nice tans and of course the freckles that go with it--can't wait for the new baby--???? boy or girl. Darcy looks great and is feeling good too...Dad and I are planning to go to Georgia when Eileen has the baby--probably stay a week or so--I just hope it arrives on time so I can be here when Darcy has hers--she'll really need me--especially with Erin starting kindergarten. I can see a very hectic fall this year.

I love reading this section about my nieces and the new babies on the way. I became an aunt when I was only 10 years old and from that time on, it seemed every year one of my siblings was either pregnant or having a baby. I adored babies, loved to babysit, loved to play with my nieces. My brother Tom's children--Melanie, Erin, and Kate--were part of my daily life when I lived at home. I had also spent one summer living with my sister Mary Jane when her first daughter, Natalie, was about two years old, before her daughter Leah was born. I carried photos of all my nieces in my wallet, showed them to my friends, and entertained people with stories about them. Natalie was especially adventurous and precocious, and her preschool years provided lots of comic material.

We were all excited about the new babies coming, but my mom was bit stressed. In the days before sonograms, "due dates" were pretty broad predictions. Eileen's due date had been pushed out from late August to September 4;  Darcy was due later in September. My mother wanted to make sure both my sister and sister-in-law got all the help they'd need.

Meanwhile, she was parenting me from afar, asking me for my school supply list for my next year of college, and also offering to order me bras from Montgomery Ward and get me running shoes from Sears.

The giant Sears and Montgomery Ward catalogs were staples in our household, with page corners turned down and favorite items circled. My mother bought nearly everything from them, especially after we moved to Virginia and were 20 miles from any kind of department store and more than 60 miles away from the nearest mall.

I still remember her calling the catalog telephone operators with her list in hand. She'd very carefully read out the item numbers over the phone, then the size, color, and quantity and the operator would repeat the info back to her. In the days before computers, everything was done manually and you never knew if what you ordered was in stock or not or exactly when it would be shipped or arrive. How many times was I bitterly disappointed when a package arrived from Sears with a note that the item I'd wanted most from the order was unavailable?

Today I live in a town with more stores than I could ever visit, and I also do a lot of shopping online. It's so easy to find what I need when I need it. It's hard to even remember what a challenge it was to get shoes, clothes, etc. when we lived out in the country in the 70s and 80s.

My mother closed her long chatty letter in her usual way:

Oh well--it's getting late--have my novena prayers + rosary to say. Take care of yourself Veronica--give our love to Eric--we love you.

Love always,

Mom

(This post is part of a series and larger project. Read about its beginning here.)

My Italian grandmother didn't emigrate to the United States until she was nearly 40. When I asked her if she ever missed Italy, she said no. All she remembered was being hungry. She lived a hard-scrabble peasant life in a tiny village about 25 miles away from Rome. Life there was a struggle, but grandma had a milk cow. One day she was in the barn milking it when a huge storm hit. A ball of lightning rolled into the barn, struck and killed the cow, and knocked my grandmother to the ground. Unsurprisingly, my grandmother was terrified of lightning and this fear, it seems, was passed onto my mother.

My parents lived in the Shenandoah Valley and storms would roll over the mountains suddenly. In our first house in Virginia, all the lightbulbs would blow when lightning struck nearby. You could hear them pop and sizzle over the roar of rain on the tin roof. My poor mother would be beside herself.

In late June, she sent me a letter in Oklahoma, detailing the terror she felt during one of the June storms:

We had a very bad thunderstorm last Thurs. afternoon around 5--very bad winds, thunder, lightening [sic] and hail. I was here all alone and scared to death--praying out loud for the whole family--it is the worse I've seen here. McCrays Metal storage barn was completely demolished--hit the truck and totaled that too--the truck saved his home--it would have crashed right on his house--there were twisted pieces all over the yard--plus trees were down on 39 near there--Our lights were off until 10:30 that evening. Melanie was at the day girl scout camp that day but she said it wasn't too bad in the back there. It's strange how these storms hit--Lexington didn't get anything.

Reading that, I remember how my mother used to hurl prayers at the heavens during bad storms, sometimes shouting them, sometimes almost wailing. When I was younger, the loud prayers combined with the mayhem outside made me think the world might be ending.

That summer in Oklahoma, my own unease with storms was heightened by the fact I was now living in Tornado Alley. There was an underground storm shelter in the housing area on the Army base and warning sirens would go off, alerting people to head to the shelter. Later, when Eric and I were married and living off base, we didn't have a basement or a storm cellar (amusingly called a "scaredy hole" by some of the natives).

In that scenario, the standard advice is to take shelter in an area in the center of your house--preferably a hallway, small bathroom, or closet. Ever my mother's daughter, I never hesitated to retreat to those places during my Oklahoma years. While I'd be making a dash for the closet or bathroom, Eric, a storm lover, would be Defying His Wife and All Safety Advice by hovering by the glass doors or the picture window, watching the lightning strike and the trees bend and the sky turn green.

We had many an argument. I'd holler for him to Take Shelter, Dammit and he'd treat me like I was over reacting, forcing me to quote, yet again, news stories about wives that pulled their reluctant husbands into a closet and saved their manly asses when everything collapsed around them.

I've had several close encounters with tornadoes, in Oklahoma and Virginia and I take storms seriously. Nowadays every time we have a severe storm or tornado warning, I'm grateful for our (steel-reinforced) finished basement. It's the perfect cozy place to escape the sights, sounds, and fury of thunderstorms, tornadoes, hurricanes, and the like.  Now that my husband is older and wiser, he's much more likely to join me down there when the wild winds blow, though sometimes I will still find him standing at the picture window, watching Mother Nature have a tantrum.

(This post is part of a series and larger project. Read about its beginning here.)

My mom never raised a big fuss about it, but she was clearly uncomfortable with me staying with my fiance that summer after my freshman year of college. I had planned to share a house with a woman I knew but that plan fell through at the last minute and so I moved into the three bedroom house Eric had been assigned to on the Army base.

My mother loved Eric but that doesn't mean she loved the idea of me staying with him. She was Italian and Catholic, and while social mores had dramatically changed all across America during the 60s and 70s, my mother had not. She would not let me get in a car with a boy who was not my brother or my official boyfriend. She had strong ideas about what constituted a "respectable" woman. Having male friends or casual boyfriends wasn't something she approved of so you can imagine how difficult it was for her have her 19-year-old daughter living with her fiance' for the summer.

I was religious and concerned with doing the right thing, but in my mind actions mattered, appearances did not. Sometimes when we clashed during my high school years my mother would end up shouting, "What will people think?" and in a fit of frustration I would reply, "Who cares?!!!"  I was not concerned about my reputation the way she was. I knew who I was, what I believed, how I conducted myself.  Anyone inclined to talk behind my back and make comments or spread rumours was not someone I was going to worry about pleasing.

I appreciate that my mother didn't raise a big fuss over my living arrangements that summer but that didn't mean she didn't make her concerns known. For example, she refused to address letters in my name while I was staying with Eric because she did not want the postman to know I was living at the same address. Every envelope that summer was addressed to Eric but every letter inside started with "Dear Veronica."

In one letter in late June she asked me if Eric's mother knew I was in Oklahoma for the summer ("just wondering," she added). In another letter from that same time period she wrote:

Do you get any mail from your friends--I wonder what some of their mothers think of you spending the summer there in Oklahoma--You know how some of these Southern mothers are and the small town gossip. I say very little to anyone--just tell them you are on vacation.

Reading these letters today I realize my mother was not only concerned about MY reputation but her own. She did not want to be labeled a "bad" mother for not reining me in. She trusted me. She trusted Eric. She knew that despite my age, our relationship was mature and serious and we were planning to marry. She could accept my choices because of that, but she couldn't bear the thought of anyone criticizing her for letting me make them.

As a mother of teenagers, I can understand where she's coming from. I've often given my kids more freedom and less supervision than many of the other parents in our circle. I trust my kids and their judgment, and while I feel good about how I've handled them, I have sometimes wondered what "the small town gossips" might say about my family. Thankfully, during those uncomfortable moments, my 18-year-old self pipes up loud and clear with a message: "Who cares?!!!" 

Who cares, indeed.

(This post is part of a series and larger project. Read about its beginning here.)

May turned to June and I settled into life in Oklahoma. While my mother was a true domestic goddess in terms of cleaning, cooking, and gardening, I was a novice.

That summer I was 19, finally learning to cook and sharing news of my successes (and failures) with my mother. When I tried to cook as she did, from scratch and without recipes, I often got things wrong. I struggled estimating cooking times and getting everything on the table at once, and I had no sense of what herbs and seasonings went with what foods in what quantities. Eric bought a Better Homes and Garden step-by-step cookbook with recipes and techniques explained, and this helped me tremendously.

My mother shared tips and ideas from afar in her usual writing style, punctuated with dashes rather than commas or periods:

Our strawberries are really coming in--I picked 3 qts yesterday--If you feel like making a strawberry shortcake for Eric get a mix--make it in 2 round cake pans--then slit each one in half--you can always put on in the freezer--slice strawberries in between the layers and cover with cool-whip. The one you put in the freezer--don't slice it till you take it out otherwise it's hard to take apart without breaking it--It can be sliced while it's frozen--you know what I mean. How are you doing with the meals--Eric said you made a good meat-loaf. With hot weather you can make a little potatoe [sic] salad--keep it in the refrigerator--goes good with hamburgers. Just boil potatoes--slice--add diced celery, onion, a pickle, season with salt, pepper--mayonnaise and mix well--You can always buy frozen french fries--they are handy with steak or burgers a nice veg and salad and it's quick--Also your omelets--they're inexpensive and nourishing. If you make stew--Krogers has frozen stew veg--look for them--they have a good recipe right on the bag--Oh well--have fun.

My father, who was supposedly retired, had started working again:

Dad is working--it's at a Vepco substation--just about 8 miles from here which makes it great--works 4 days a week--10 hrs. a day--this gives him Friday off--a nice long week-end. I think he is going to ask David [a neighbor I went to high school with] to help him with the grapes--that's his biggest concern right now.

The grapes. My father's dream was to establish a vineyard and a winery on the farm. This year he hoped to make major progress.

He ordered mulch from Bargers in Lexington and Mr. Reed is delivering it--As they weed, they are going to mulch them and put in posts and wire from them to grow on.

Meanwhile, my mother reported that the garden was growing like crazy because of the recent rain, and she was busy with her own outdoor projects. 

My dad and my brothers had built the house we called home on the farm. We had moved into it before it was completed, three years earlier. It took a long time to finish the interior and solve an issue with the back wall. My father had fixed that and added a screened porch before turning his attention to the garden and the grapes. Now my mother was turning what had long been a cow pasture and construction site into something resembling a landscaped yard.

I have been trying to weed the flowerbeds and keep the grass cut--Looks like some of the vetch seed took on the back hill--I have really been watering it. I sure would like the back leveled off and seeded--that is my goal for this summer--I work on it a little every day. 

I am in awe of my parents' work ethic. They were in their 60s at this time and had not slowed down a bit.

I never matched their stamina or skill with manual labor, but I put countless hours into my classes and academics:

Congratulations--straight A's. Dad and I received your grades the other day and yesterday they sent them to you too. Your hard work payed[sic] off--

Your name was in the Lexingtion Gazette and the Buena Vista newspaper had a listing of the students from M.W.C. that are on the deans list. Today in the mail you received a letter and certificate...We are very proud of you Veronica--keep up the good work--I hope you are getting some time for reading.

Being an overachiever, I had bought the textbooks for my fall classes at the end of the spring semester and had my parents mail them to me in Oklahoma so over the summer I could get ahead on the reading for the next semester. Sigh.

Present day me thinks 19-year-old me was Way Too Uptight About School, and yet I also admire everything I did to stay organized and ahead of the game.

Today I have a teenage daughter who works hard and does extremely well in school and a son who puts everything off until the last possible minute and seldom gives his classes a second thought. I sometimes chastise him because his grades don't reflect his considerable intelligence and he is doing himself a disservice. At the opposite end of the parenting spectrum, I sometimes have to remind my daughter that while I'm very proud of what she's accomplished, grades are not the measure of her worth.

I wish I had known that when I was a teen and a college student. I was too anxious about my school performance, attached too much of my identity to my GPA, and my fear of failure held me back at times. It would be years before I started to shake loose from the chains I'd forged around myself and developed a healthy confidence in myself and my abilities.

(This post is part of a series and larger project. Read about its beginning here.)