With this being Easter weekend, I took a walk down memory lane. The earliest Easter I can remember, I was very sick. The memory feels surreal, I was laying on a hard couch or loveseat in a room in our house where no one else was. I remember hearing lots of noise and conversations...with 8 people in the house, it was never quiet. I was very young and most likely in Kentucky or Tennessee. I don't remember how I got there, I just remember waking up to a very weird smell and a crinkling sound coming from my chest. Mama was checking a mustard plaster or something that she had spread on my chest and I think it was wax paper that she had covering it. I must've had a high fever, the memory almost seems like a hallucination. I think I dozed off again. Then the next memory, I'm not sure if it's the same day or the next but it seems like it was AFTER Easter and I was taken outside to our barbeque grill. When someone opened it, there was a Barbie doll in there for me. The feeling I get from this memory is very strange, I'm thinking it was because I was so sick. Mama had told me that once, when I was very young, I dehydrated and almost had to go to the hospital. I wonder if this is that time.
When our kids were young, we didn't get them the traditional Easter baskets, we always got them a toy of some kind and had the candy in or around the toy. I remember we had found these bats called Mondo bats that were plastic and shaped almost like a big funnel. They would hit the ball with it and it made a loud, funny noise. We had put the candy and little toys inside the bats and had them on the couch Sunday morning for the boys to find and play with.
We had big family gatherings with an Easter egg hunt at Pop and Granny's house. All the nieces and nephews and Tyler and Wes had baskets that Granny always had for them and the adults would go hide the eggs and then open the front door and let them loose! It was crazy, loud and hysterical funny to watch!
Then when ours got older, they and their cousins were the ones that would hide the eggs as the younger cousins went out to find them.
This year is going to be quiet, for the first time in years we aren't going to the family gathering and neither of our sons will be around so it will be just the 2 of us.
So far....being empty-nesters isn't all it was cracked up to be.
Musings from a modern day Mamaw
Today is March 18th, two days from the first day of Spring and it was a beautiful day! Looked, felt and smelled like a summer day. I had been reading on my back porch, listening to the birds and windchimes in the background and I looked out into the yard and noticed how bright the sun was. The thought went through my mind that I should be laying in the sun! So I dropped my Kindle and ran to my room! Threw my bikini on, grabbed a couple of beach towels, suntan oil spray and fixed a big bottle of water with lemon and cucumber slices and hit the the back door! There was a pretty strong breeze and it felt fabulous because in just a few minutes, I was feeling the sun.
Once I got situated I started to daydream and took a walk down memory lane. Almost every time I lay in the sun I remember days when I was in high school when during the summer, Mom and I would lay side by side on our lounge chairs in the back yard and soak up the sun. She always used a hard little twist-up thing of cocoa butter and I can still remember the smell.
Living in South Florida, she wore her bathing suit almost every day. She had several different colors but the same cut, I remember a light green and white one and a coral and white one. She was a little thick around the middle but she wore a two piece and had the most amazing legs! She was such a beautiful woman and always had the perfect, golden tan. She wore her nails long and took care of them herself, her favorite nail polish was Revlon, Fire Pearl. It was a slightly pearlized darker hot pink and looked great on her with her tan.
We would lay there soaking up the sun until we started to get hot and then walk down the steps of the pool and swim down to the deep end and back. Our dog always laid under one of our chairs and she would also walk into the pool, swim down to the deep end and back. The three of us girls would then casually walk back up and out to our chairs, Mom and I would lay back down and Sandy would ZOOM 'round and 'round the back yard until she wore herself out and then would lay back down under our chair, waiting for our next swim.
Mom didn't drive at that time, I don't remember ever going anywhere with her, just her and I, so those moments in the sun, in the peace and quiet of a beautiful summer day, were our Mother/Daughter time, that and when she would let me sit in the bottom of her closet, trying on all of her high heels, she had so many, in colors to match different outfits, and I dreamt of one day being able to wear them. My feet never did get big enough.
The smell of Estee Lauder Youth Dew, Wrigley's Spearmint gum and leather and warm summer days....these are the things that make me feel like she is right beside me, happy, young and tan.
Musings of a modern day mamaw.
Mom and her first two daughters-in law. Look at those legs!
So last night I was scrolling around on Facebook and Instagram, watching videos and whatnot and saw a few pics that friends had taken on Snapchat. I hadn't been on Snapchat for awhile so I clicked over to see what was new and goofed around with some of the filters to see what they did...you know exactly what I mean right? (most we don't save. 😁😁 )
I saw this cute one that someone had used to take a selfie with me over the weekend but I didn't realize that it was a voice changer! OMG! Did I have a ball with that? Now mind you, I am home alone with no one else to hear what I say or do so I was WIDE open. LOL! I like to imitate voices, not specific voices, just accents I guess I should say. So I recorded this goofy, corny, southern accent saying off the wall stuff and sent a message to my hubby....knowing he would bust out laughing and wishing I was sitting there when he did! He sends me a text that says, "You're not all there, that's funny! LOL" I was still watching it over and over and laughing my butt off and of course....I made another one! I posted that one on fb and then watched it over and over about 6 times and let me tell you what...I was laughing so hard I was crying, I mean, loud, belly laughs...so much that it made my little dog nervous! He ran up to me and put his paws up on my legs to see if I was okay and I was laughing so hard I really couldn't even talk to him. By the time I made myself stop watching it because it was past my bedtime, my stomach muscles hurt, my nose was running and I needed to wipe the tears off my face!
As I was getting ready for bed, I kept thinking about it but what I was thinking was...that was ME I was laughing at. My silly self being funny and it was a blast! I hadn't laughed like that in a long time and it felt good and happy!! I had hesitated to post it on fb because...what would people think, right? Then I felt so good and was having so much fun I just wanted someone else to enjoy it too, even at the cost of making me look silly. No, I was not drinking, it was just me, being spontaneous and silly.
At what point in our lives do we lose that childish nature? That fun loving, silly, spontaneous, goofy side of ourselves that we used to be? As a child, you just react, you do or say whatever crosses your mind and don't worry about what people think. In fact, thinking of our granddaughters, when they are doing something that makes people laugh, they KEEP on doing it, over and over...until someone cries Uncle and it usually isn't the kid!
I miss that whimsical, happy-go-lucky, carefree feeling. At some point we snuff it out because we are too grown up to behave like that. ~tsk~ What? I've always had a good sense of humor and loved making people laugh, I put humor in so much of my day, it puts people at ease...most of the time. I have had a customer on the line that I try something funny, a silly one liner to ease some tension and I hear crickets....so then I put my adult attitude back into play and move on...
But thinking back, in the banking industry, it is so dry, conservative, always have to look and act professional...well I get that, but we are talking to real human beings who have thoughts and feelings too and you never know what is going on with a person. Why not be the laughter and sunshine in their day for just a little bit, who cares if you make yourself look silly? If I've made someone laugh, it makes me happy!
Is it that I'm getting older and getting to the point where I really don't care what people think? Who knows, but I've found that goof-ball girl again and I like her, I think I'll keep her around.
Musings of a modern day mamaw.
