my mom Archives - Page 15 of 16 - Ramblin' with Roger

Anniversary

“I may be a headache, but never a bore.”

My parents were married on March 12, 1950, in Binghamton, NY. I always found that very convenient to remember; I would often say that I was their early third-anniversary present.

When their 50th anniversary was coming up – in 2000 (easy math!) – my sisters and I were trying to plan a surprise party at my parents’ church in Charlotte, NC. The only trouble was that there was an occasional conflict with the date, which was a Sunday. It turns out that my father was ALSO planning a surprise anniversary party at the church, for my mother. Once we were apprised of that fact, we gave up trying to surprise them both and concentrated on her.

So my sister flew in from San Diego, and my parents-in-law, my wife and I drove down from upstate New York, staying at a local hotel. My father did most of the decorations of the room at the church. my father needed to rest more often than he did just months before when he was primarily in charge of decorating the church for Carol’s and my wedding in May of 1999.

The family did meet before that Sunday morning; I suspect my mother figured something was up even before that. But we managed to keep her away from the decorated room.

During the service itself, much to my surprise, and definitely to my mother’s, there was a renewal of my parents’ wedding vows. (Whether my father knew, I was never able to ascertain.) I’m positive that when the pastor brought her up and ask her whether she’d marry him all over again, she did think about it for a few seconds before saying, “Yes.” Undoubtedly, what ran through her mind is a quote she attributed to my father, which I heard him say once or twice, but which she repeated regularly: “I may be a headache, but never a bore.”

After the church service, we had a lovely party, and we kids DID manage to surprise both of them with a video of some still photos, put together with music. Interestingly, we never got a family photo taken, as we had in 1995 and in 1990, maybe because the process was too fraught with drama – a tale for another time. In any case, that was my parents’ last anniversary together – until now, if you believe in an afterlife – because my father died on August 10 of that year from prostate cancer.

This is what their joint headstone reads:
Leslie Harold Green
9-26-1926 8-10-2000
(Military Info…)
Les
Renaissance Man

Gertrude Elizabeth Green
11-17-1927 2-2-2011
Trudy
Wind Beneath Our Wings

February Ramblin’

I still have trouble with Leviticus myself, so this is quite intriguing.

I think I have an instinctive sense of balance about my blog between the personal and the other stuff (politics, popular culture, etc.). Obviously, that’s been skewed more than a little this month, and frankly, I’m all right with that.

Serene Green- the flower arrangement my office sent to my mother’s funeral (and which we brought to my parents’ gravesite

I received a bushel of great notes of condolences re: the passing of my mother earlier this month. Some came in the form of e-mails, others in comments to various blog posts. I received cards, e-cards, cards with flowers. This doesn’t even count the telephone calls and the face-to-face comments. One that struck me greatly was written by someone I’ve worked with for 17 years:

It must be more than just a coincidence that the last blog post you wrote before telling the news of your mother was about circle songs. When I see “Will the Circle Be Unbroken” in print, I always hear Aaron Neville’s voice, singing of “my dear old mother”.

Judging by the comments to your posts, you have many wise friends, with all manner of experiences. I’ve no clue what to say, except that your mother will live on in song, and in spirit. Bless her soul, and my best to you and all your family.

So I played the Neville Brothers’ track and I cried more than I had all month.

Anyway, I’m sure that I’ll get back to my less open-book self-analysis blog. Eventually.

Steve Bissette notes a terrific new documentary illuminating the music & marvels of composer/musician Raymond Scott. YOU may not know Raymond Scott, but the folks doing old Warner Brothers cartoons, Motown, Devo, and composer John Williams did. And speaking of my buddy Steve, there’s an interesting early 1990s, two-part Lou Mougin interview of him here and here, where he talks about Swamp Thing with Alan Moore, independent comic publishing, and other interesting items.

I get an e-mail about a “truly infamous and heinous work [called Obama Nation – get the pun?] that a couple of people in the comics profession have just done. I am just plain ashamed to see this, and the commentator can’t even bring himself to show the whole thing (though what he describes is enough to make your blood run cold). It’s like a time warp back to Jim Crow, I kid you not.”
Then Mark Evanier writes that the cartoon WASN’T “racist or disgusting, especially compared to a lot of what’s said about the Obamas on the web these days.” A low threshold, IMO.
Certainly, the caricature that Alan David Doane showed in his post makes me queasy, but ADD is certainly correct when he says that Obama Nation is “a loathsome, unfunny comic strip obviously fueled by hatred.”

From the 1944 movie Broadway Rhythm, the Ross Sisters doing Solid Potato Salad. You WILL say, “How did they DO that?”

Here’s THE most interesting thing I ever found in my spam filter:

“Unexpected lessons on the power of obedience—and how grace can fuel it. – HOW TO BE PERFECT, Daniel M. Harrell – One Church’s Audacious Experiment in Living the Old Testament Book of Leviticus. As a longtime minister and preacher who had successfully skirted Leviticus for most of his life, author Daniel Harrell wanted to come to grips with all that Leviticus teaches–not just loving neighbors, but the parts about animal sacrifice, Sabbath-keeping, skin diseases, homosexuality, and stoning sinners, too. Yet rather than approaching Leviticus with a view toward mitigating its commands, he decided to simply obey them. http://www.danielharrell.com/“

I still have trouble with Leviticus myself, so this is quite intriguing. Even if I don’t necessarily come to the same conclusions as the author – and there’s a lot here to examine without having read the book – I applaud the effort to tackle it, rather than do what some modern Bible studies do, which is to selectively ignore it.

A revision of Genesis 19.

An edit of Huck Finn that I could get behind. And, BTW, Toni Morrison’s introductionon to the 1996 Oxford edition of Huck Finn (pdf).

What ‘The Simpsons’ could teach us about global warming

“Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first woman she meets and then teams up with three complete strangers to kill again.” – Marin County newspaper’s TV listing for “The Wizard of Oz”
***
Video of Eyes on the Prize – Mavis Staples.

The Lydster, Part 83: The $50 Headache

In retrospect, I developed two theories about what happened to Lydia, which are not mutually exclusive.

Back on January 29, my wife and my daughter went down to Saugerties, about an hour south of Albany, to go to the birthday party of her ten-year-old twin cousins, my brother-in-law’s daughters. Carol and Lydia left late and so got to the party about a half-hour after its 2:30 start time.

On the return trip, Lydia complained of a raging headache, which she described as “sharks sawing into my head” and “like I’m dying”. When she got home, she curled up in my arms, not wanting to eat.

The Urgent Care place, unfortunately, closed at 6 pm, so after consulting with her pediatrician, we took his suggestion and ended up going to the emergency room at Albany Med. I can tell Lydia was not faking when she asked me to sit in the back seat of the car with her, which I’ve only done a handful of times since she was three, usually when she’s been sick or injured.

Of course, since there were people in much more obvious distress at the hospital, we ended being there about 2.5 hours. And as she got to watch the Disney Channel at a point when she should have been in bed, she started feeling better, beginning to get her appetite back. A $50 co-pay later, we went home.

In retrospect, I developed two theories about what happened to Lydia, which are not mutually exclusive. One is that she got stressed out at the party, playing with over a dozen kids she did not know, all of whom are older than she is. The other possibility is that she overheard conversations about my mother’s stroke the day before, and developed sympathetic pains. In any case, it made for a long day, between talking to my sisters on the phone, worrying about our mother, and concerned enough about our daughter that we took her to the ER.

Pictures (c)2009, Alexandria Green-House

Random Post-Funeral Thoughts

The week before my mother died, I had nothing on any credit cards, save for any recurring expenditures.

TIMING

My father died on a Thursday; we had the funeral on a Sunday, and he was buried on a Monday. My mother died on a Tuesday, and our first inclination was to have the funeral on the following Saturday. But, instead of working on the obituary or the program on that day, we sat around telling Trudy stories. I think, in some way, we died my father’s death the way he would have wanted his death to be handled, quickly and efficiently; it also helped that we knew my father was going to die at least the day beforehand. Whereas mom’s death took us, and indeed her long-time doctor, by surprise; her heart was still strong, even after the stroke, and we were having conversations about placing her in some medical facility after she got out of the hospital the very morning she died.

Once Saturday was off the table, we considered Sunday, but it was Super Bowl Sunday, on which my mother’s mother died; I remember getting the call during the 3rd quarter of the game in 1983. Besides, it was just different. My dad was the hare, my mother, the tortoise, and we all know that slow and steady win the race.

So, it was a Tuesday funeral, which had an enormous number of people outside of the family wanting to speak, and a Wednesday burial at the Salisbury National Cemetery in Salisbury, NC, about 40 miles from Charlotte, Section 8, Plot 358, next to my father. I read a few passages from the Proverbs reading my eldest niece read the day before, then sang a little, then I, then my sisters, in turn, shoveled some dirt on her cremains, then we sang some more. Then we went to Waffle House, which was one of my father’s favorite places. I believe I had only been to that gravesite once since his burial there.

FOOD

One of the traditions in the South, at least in my parents’ circle, is for people to come over, often bringing various food items, usually homemade. And by “come over”, I don’t mean that they call and ask, “Would this be a good time to come over?” I mean that they just show up. I became aware of this tradition ten and a half years ago; can’t say that I’ve gotten USED to it. But it was (mostly) nice.

MONEY

The week before my mother died, I had nothing on any credit cards, save for any recurring expenditures, such as the newspaper. Can’t say THAT right now. The next bill will be a whopper; it will include:
The funeral parlor. When my father died, the same funeral parlor accepted the promise of payment from his insurance; not so this time. So it went on my credit card. I’ll get reimbursed eventually. But it was the least amount of money we could spend, which would have pleased my mother, $840.
The obit. I totally miscalculated how much it was going to cost: $472.75. I’ll probably eat half of that.
The niece’s last-minute plane ride from California. Somewhere north of $600, which I hope to get back eventually.
The hotel. Once my wife and daughter arrived, the house would have been too crowded with my sisters, my nieces, and a family friend. Five nights, $330; not bad actually.
*Miscellaneous stuff, including a meal after our bizarre visit with the funeral home – was she high, merely incompetent, or uncaring because we weren’t spending enough? She couldn’t even spell Charlotte, and at one point, my sister threw her out of our meeting.
This doesn’t even count the train tickets or the rental car, which are on my WIFE’S credit card. BTW, 3 days out on Amtrak is a better rate than 2 days out, which is WAY better than one day out.

TECHNOLOGY

I had access to the home computer, but I didn’t have one of my own. My wife actually brought the daughter’s laptop, but it was uncharged, and she forgot the plug, so it didn’t work.

Of course, I had to focus on the funeral stuff and managed to write four blog posts in the 12 days I was down there. Viva the blogger’s reserve, which I was trying to create for our vacation this fall. C’est la vie.

The hotel had one (count’em, ONE) computer in the “business center”, which was often occupied. Once I was on it – at 2:48 a.m. – and some young woman came down and said, “This is the ONLY computer here? I have to do my homework!” I ceded it to her at 3 a.m. after I’d spent an hour on it. BTW, it needs a new keyboard; the a, c, e, m, and n were unreadable.

The house printer didn’t work. The hotel printer was quirky, at best.

I used my cellphone more in that two-week period than I had in all the previous two years.

One Twitter tweet, one Facebook post. Just no time for it.
***
The train ride back from Charlotte to Albany last Friday.

Trudy’s funeral program

It’s about the widow giving all she had. The lectionary recommends reading that introductory part about “teachers of the law [liking] to walk around in flowing robes and love to be greeted in the marketplaces and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers.”

Since, once again, I’m writing about this before the fact, I thought I’d describe the thought process behind what (presumably) took place at the service yesterday.

The front of the bulletin, in addition to the usual information, contains this scripture: “My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry.” (James 1:19). I think Leslie picked this scripture and it was pretty accurate. I opted for the New International Version because most of the other versions mention only “brothers”, or “brethren”.

ORDER OF SERVICE

In lieu of a wake, there was scheduled to be a time for the family to receive friends at the church from 1 to 1:45 pm. During this time, my niece Alex was putting together a bunch of photos of Mom, both solo and in various family combinations. At the same time, there would be secular music playing: Johnny Mathis, Ray Charles, and especially her favorite, Nat ‘King’ Cole. She had a bunch of Cole 78s when I was growing up.

Prelude-“Sweet, Sweet Spirit”
Though this is a reference to the Holy Spirit, she did in fact have a sweet spirit.

Lighting the Candle – the granddaughters
My mother had three granddaughters: Leslie’s daughter, Rebecca Staubes, who is 32; Marcia’s daughter, Alexandria Green-House, who turned 20 at the end of December; and Lydia, my daughter, who will turn 7 next month. Assuming Becky can get a flight, this will be the first time that Rebecca and Lydia have met, though the older two and the younger two are very tight. And Lydia has seen Rebecca on Wipeout.

Invocation – Rev. Cannon

Hymn of Praise- – “Goin’ Up Yonder”
Initially, it was going to be “I’ll Fly Away”, a song I always associate with that great TV show of the early 1990s, starring Regina Taylor a pre-“Law & Order” Sam Waterston, as well as the soundtrack to the movie O Brother Where Art Thou. The final selection, though, I don’t particularly know.

Scriptural Reading: Proverbs 31:10-31
The Wife of Noble Character, or the Virtuous Woman, which Leslie picked out, and which her daughter Rebecca will read.

Prayer of Comfort
We’re hoping that her former pastor, Rev. George Goodman, can read this.

Scriptural Reading: Psalm 23
My sister Marcia will read the King James version.

Musical Selection: “It Is Well With My Soul”
A woman from the church, Myrtle Miller, volunteered to sing this. It’s in many hymnals. I associate it with the funeral of the funeral of our tenor soloist back at my old church, Sandy Cohen, who died Christmas Eve 1990.

Scriptural Reading: 1 Corinthians 13:4-13
My niece Alexandria will read the passage that has almost become a cliche at weddings.

Sharing Memories
We’ve lined up a number of folks from the church to speak, for no more than two minutes (we hope), then my mom’s cousin Fran (if she makes it), Leslie, and me.

Scripture Reading: Luke 20:45-21:4
I picked this one, which my wife Carol will read. It’s about the widow giving all she had. One of my sisters wanted to limit it to the Luke 21 part, but I wanted, and the lectionary (suggested reading) recommends, reading that introductory part about “teachers of the law [liking] to walk around in flowing robes and love to be greeted in the marketplaces and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers.”

Eulogy-Rev. Cannon

Musical Selection: “By and By”-the Green Family.
An old song I associate with Leadbelly.

Recessional: “God Be With You”

Then, it is our intention to play a recording of Sing, Sing, Sing, the classic Louis Prima song heavily associated with Benny Goodman. She loved the big band sound.