Barbara Mae

December 17, 2018

Greetings from the storyteller,

Imagine this incredible story; somewhere in Asia, several hundred generations ago, a woman began a family.  Her descendants braved the frozen tundra of Russia and risked the icebridge that connected to North America.  They migrated south to find warmer lands, found game and water and forests to live in.  Made their way east, forming tribes to work and live together.  Until they were the Chippewa people. 

And generations passed until a descendant, a woman, met a man from England, another adventure in the making, and they married.  And one day they had a daughter, and her name was Barbara Mae. 

She of many names, Barbara Mae Bromhead Smith Watts, was also called Mother by five of us, called Grandmother by a dozen more. 

You can sense she is part of an amazing story, and you can know more of it by knowing any of us.  We will tell you, and show you with our lives, what Mom’s story is.  It is left to us now.

In every culture you can name, there have been storytellers.  Before the written word it was the way that news was given, that traditions were passed on, that people shared of themselves.  The Masai, the Inuit, the twelve tribes of Israel, the Chippewa.  People would gather around at celebrations, at dinner tables, at funerals, and the elders would tell the stories.  The people would nod and listen, and they would carry the stories away to their own homes, their families, other places, and tell them again.

We carried on that tradition yesterday in our house, told the stories about Mom.  It is how we honor her, and how we carry her with us after this day.

The house was just what Mom would have wanted.  Packed with noisy people, crowded together in every room, eating and laughing and loving each other, and telling the stories.  It was so much like the living room of our house growing up, family and friends, packed onto the sofa, folding chairs, the steps, around the breakfast room table, singing, dancing, celebrating, and telling their stories.

Mom was a natural host, our home a welcoming place, even in its simplicity.  Children roamed in and out freely, neighbors hovered over coffee, parties sprung up, sometimes overflowing into the back yard.  People were drawn to her, and she made intimate friends whose bonds spanned decades.

She devoted this time of her life to raising her children and making a home.  She sewed our clothes, made dinner every night, warmed us in the kitchen by the open oven while she cooked oatmeal before school.  She patched us up, helped us with math, took us to Catechism.  Forgave us for skipping Catechism.  She gave us the guidance, and a generous freedom, for us to be ready to start our own adventures. 

She loved to skate when she was a teenager, and the grace and elegance and strength that took her across the ice she carried into the rest of her life.  She was stylish, creative, resourceful, and always loving.  When her family grew, she rolled up her sleeves and took us camping, sometimes for weeks at a time, first in tents and then a hilarious travel trailer. 

When it was time to end the chapter with our father, she moved on into a new life.  After a few years she brought Ron into the adventure, and for thirty-seven years they created another rich story together.  They travelled many miles, but she was happiest when she was in their little cottage, watching the animals and birds and flowers that surrounded them.

Yesterday, in our hot, crowded, noisy house, people who knew her told stories about her.  She was beautiful.  She was gracious.  She was a friend, a partner, a love.  She was a story teller, sometimes so creative it was hard to know where her imagination and memory overlapped.  She was always so cheerful, and her home was a place you wanted to visit.  She devoted her life to her children.

It was a joy for me to hear the stories again, from my brother and sisters, and from all those who knew Mom.  It was too easy to only remember her in the last weeks, the last years, when time had made things hard for her, harder than anyone could stand.  When people shared her other stories, it brought her back to me, all of the life she filled, the fun and lively, the one filled with an eternal horizon.  It was like wading into a cool stream on a hot day.

For nearly nine decades Barbara Mae wove her story in with ours.  And then she left it with us to tell.  The poet Margaret Atwood once said, “In the end we’ll all become stories.”

It is a legacy as old as humanity.  We tell the stories.  As long as the stories are told, we are remembered, and we remain in the lives of those who tell them.  It will be how we honor Mom, and how we carry her with us after this day, and every day until we are together again.

Hope this finds you telling yours,

David

Copyright © 2018 David Smith