Her tale starts in 1947 with graduation from high school. Found programs for the three-day event: Baccalaureate (prayer), Class Night (speeches), and Commencement (diploma). Reading down the roster, ah there she is: Mom was Valedictorian. Wouldn't it be fun to know what her speech was! [10 seconds later] Ha ha! Her handwritten speech.
Class motto from Shakespeare: "Climbing Steep Hills Requires Slow Pace at First." Isn't that a perfect message for this journey?? Her speech shows that she expected life to be arduous, with many dues needing to be paid in order to reach reward. That hard effort was required. How different would her life have been if she understood the law of attraction at that young age?
In the pre-computer age, somehow I'm really
surprised to see such an imaginative font, and
wish it was still around.
She jumped into college with both feet. I once asked her what her major was, and she said "boys." Pretty much. She was engaged within a couple months, despite dating two men, Rod and Jim. She didn't know how to turn down dates. Describes Jim, whom she'd known from HS, as irritating her much of the time, being too serious. "If I don't stop going out with him so much, I won't even like him at all." "I don't want to go out, but what can I do?" Months later, she finally broke up with him, breaking his heart. She had already returned Rod's ring, though they continued to date. "Rod and I are getting along much better than when we were engaged. It's important to get to know each other first before falling in love." Rod was 27 she was 18. Her dad was 16 years older than her mom, who married at the tender age of 20.
They went to J-Hops, "it costs $5 but Tommy Dorsey is playing."
Took a music class, loved it. "I have a funny teacher, I mean queer by that." Loved the teacher, loved the Bach and Debussy, though eventually failed the class, not studying enough to pass the challenging tests.
Her low grades shock me. She was one of the smartest women I've ever known, able to keep up with my brilliant dad. Yet she had pretty much a C average, with some Bs, and a D or two. Her letters are peppered with, "I really should study, but there's a concert we're going to..." In one letter, she shared her midterm grades, all Cs. "Sorry, but I'm satisfied, don't know about you. You probably won't be, but you don't need to start bawling me out, [uncle] Daryl did it for you. You and I both know I could make Bs, but I'm just not interested in marks." Years later, when she went to college to earn her Psych Tech degree, she labored over every missed point if she didn't earn 100% on her tests. She was a straight-A student then. This makes me realize how very proud she must have been with my academic prowess.
Women were so slim back then, and Mom had had bouts of pudginess in childhood, setting the tone for lifelong body image issues. She laments that her waist grew an inch, "I measure 39-25-39 now and my tummy sticks out. I'm positively beginning to look matronly." No words.
Her self-worth had been damaged in the awful relationship with her emotionally abusive father. Puzzled by the attention of so many college boys, "what's the matter with me? I'm not special, you know that. I'm not half as cute as a lot of girls, and don't have as good a figure either. The kids say I'm a lot of fun here at the dorm but heaven knows theres are millions of girls that are a lot of fun. Why is it that everyone I go out with like me so much, and I never like them quite as much in return?"
Mom was gorgeous, smart, kind, with a stunning hourglass figure, and she didn't know it. Makes me wonder how much I've carried on that same refrain through life?
[[college pic here later]]
No comments:
Post a Comment