The Best Mother - and the Worst Mother

Today is Mother's Day. Every day should be Mother's Day. A good mother is the most valuable person in a child's life. A bad mother or a lack of a mother can have the worst possible effect on a child.

My Mother at 14, Lois Robison

Lois Robison Council

As we recently celebrated family with a gathering of my siblings and descendants of my parents, my mother's spirit was there, I know. I am convinced her purpose in life was to give her children the very best opportunity to live a happy life. She wanted me to grow up healthy because I had many childhood illnesses. She feared I would be hurt because I wore my feelings on my sleeves, and she saw how I could plummet to the depths of despair when someone hurt me. 

Like most mothers who love their children, she would have taken all pain from me and suffered it herself if she could. A good mother is selfless with her children. My friends said they wished she were their mother, not because she was easy on us, but because she was "motherly".

Not cut out for motherhood

I have seen women who don't seem to have the motherhood gene. A woman who lets a man come between her and her child is not a good mother. A woman who refuses to see that her boyfriend or husband abuses her child is a failure at motherhood.

Some mothers love their child, but don't enjoy their child. Mothers who can't show love, don't cuddle or hug a child, who are cold toward their child, teach them to be unfeeling and leave a lasting mark on that person. I have seen this behavior pass down through three generations. 

Unselfish Love

Mothers who love their children and show it, raise loving adults. That was my mother - the most loving person I have ever known. My sisters and I learned to love unselfishly. That is why on Mother's Day and every day, I think about my mother and what she did for me, gave me and taught me. Even now, after all the years she has been gone, I long to climb into her lap and feel her arms around me, smell the particular odor of her clean dress, her skin and the Ivory soap she used. Just a short time there cured most of my ills, and I am sure she would cure the sadness and sorrows of life now.

If I'd had children, I wanted to be exactly like my role model, the best mother in the whole world. 

Will you take this baby?

We have no children, but children have always been an important part of our lives. Today while talking with Ann Stone, lymphodema therapist, as she worked on Barry's swollen leg, I remembered something quite strange that happened thirty five years ago.
At the time I worked with my sister-in-law, Yvonne, at Humpty-Dumpty Kindergarten. I adored the children in my classes, and at times I felt sad that we had no children of our own.
The truth came home to me when I had to have a hysterectomy. That was final! Now the whole thing was out of my hands. No children for me. BB said it was God's will. He had never been keen on being a father.

I arrived home around two o'clock one afternoon, went back to the bedroom and began changing clothes. The telephone rang and I answered.
A woman's voice said, "Is this Glenda Beall?"
"Yes."
"Would you take a baby that hasn't been born yet?"
"Well, I don't know." I couldn't believe my ears. This person wanted to give me a baby.
"Who is this? Tell me about the baby," I said to the anonymous caller.
"I can't tell you anything else. I just want to know if you will take this baby."
"Well, I can't say yes or no right now. I have to talk to my husband. I'd want to know more before I could answer. Call me back tonight."
"I can't. I have to know right now. Will you take this baby?"
Of course I had to tell her I could not accept a child from an anonymous voice on the phone. I had no idea who she was or who was having the baby or even if it would be legal to take this baby.
I never heard from the woman again. And I never knew who called. I suspected that an unmarried teen in our rural community had become pregnant. It had to be someone who knew us and felt confident we would give the child a good home.
I said to Barry, "If it is God's will that we have no children of our own, could it be God's will that we are to love the child of someone else? Was that strange conversation on the telephone God's way of saying, "this is your child?"
For many years that voice on the phone haunted me. What happened to that baby? Did it have a good life? What if we had taken the infant? How would it have changed our lives?
Another time we were chosen and asked to adopt a baby but we declined. What were we afraid of? Responsibility? The unknown personality or behavior of a child birthed by strangers? What kinds of traits would this baby inherit?

On Friday my niece will come and help us with things I can't do and Barry is unable to do. She spent some months living with us in her youth. She was adopted and adored by my sister and brother-in-law. Might we have had a daughter about her age now, or a son who would come and take Barry for physical therapy or help with chores around the house? I'm sure he would enjoy watching the golf tournaments on TV with his father.
What if? That simple question in a writer's mind often launches a novel.