Happy Birthday, Momma

Monday, March 12, 2012 marked the 89^th anniversary of my Mother’s birth.  89 is an age not all that many people get to observe for any number of reasons.  Well, no one ever said it would be easy attaining such an age.  Bette Davis perhaps said it best when she observed “Old age is not for sissies.”

Mom had a twin sister, Texas Lucille, who died at an early age, at 18 months in 1924.    She was buried somewhere around Rawl, West Virginia, probably in an unmarked grave.  No one knows where that grave is now.

Three other siblings died young: Lena Faye, Nov. 1928-Sept. 1929, Frankie (girl) April 1931-Sept. 1931, and Agnus April 1937.  Of the first four who did survive, Mom was the only girl.  Her brother, Millard, was the oldest. Mom came second, and after her came Harper and Ralph.

School in Mom’s day consisted of a series of one-room schools.  Grandpa Walter bought books for her brothers, but didn’t think his girl would need an education, so she did without textbooks.

This was harsh, but harsher still was her health.  As a child, Mom was sickly and because of this, she missed a lot of school.  But Mom had one thing and that was an indomitable spirit that allowed her to conquer obstacles many might have thought impossible to overcome.

When World War II came along, Millard and Harper left for the military.  Ralph was too young at the outset of the war, but eventually left for the Army in 1944.  Mom stayed back for a bit and helped her parents, but eventually was called away to Huntington, WV, to find work.

She took her first jobs as a live-in maid/nanny and kept these jobs until she relocated to Louisa, KY, where she got a job at the hospital there as the cook’s helper.  In fact, at one point, when the cook was hospitalized for a gall bladder operation, Mom took over and never missed a step.

Mom was the only girl in her family for a spell, but eventually, she had four sisters: Edith, the oldest was born in 1935; then Alaphare; Delores or Boots; and Diana Kaye, the youngest, who was born in 1945. 

Mom knew her mother was up against it, what with these four girls to take care of, and in a house with no electricity and no washing machine.  So she stepped up and bought her mother a $300.00 gasoline-powered wringer washer.  That would equate to a huge expenditure today, but that didn’t deter my Mom.

For their part, her younger sisters still look up to her as a Mother-figure as she did all she could to help them out.

On May 19, 1951, Mom and my Dad, Graham Phillips, were married on Grapevine by Church of Christ preacher Bill Johnson.  This is the church Mom was baptized into 74 years ago.

That blessed union resulted in our little family of six: Mom and Dad; brother Steve; sister Jewel; me; and sister Anna May.  We have since lost our Dad, who passed away in 1990, then Steve in 2007, but we soldier on, with Mom as our matriarch.

Everyone in our family, maternal and paternal relatives, all love her dearly, and we all feel as though our lives are so much richer because of her. 

And to Mom, we all say, Happy Birthday to a very wonderful lady.