It’s hard for me to believe that it’s been 7 yrs since my
mother left us.
There are nights when my dreams feel VERY real, and I can
hear my mother telling me certain things…just as she did while she was here
with us.
-“Mark Alan…you make sure your girls are taken care of,
whatever you do”
-“Mark Alan…trust God, he will see always see you through"
- "Mark Alan....let them people think what they want to about you"
- “Mark Alan…you better get your butt outta bed”
It’s amazing that we live our lives learning from our
parents, yet sometimes we are oblivious to the teachings! I vividly remember a conversation I had with
my mother when I was 6 yrs old, standing on a chair in the kitchen washing
dishes.
My mother said to me:
“I’m going to teach you how to cook , wash
clothes & iron.”
I replied to her, “I’m
going to get married so I won’t need to know how to do that stuff”. I think she might have cried from laughing so
hard, but managed to tell me “aint no woman going to want to take care of
no man that don’t know how to do nothing for himself”. That has NEVER left my brain!
She commenced to teaching my brother and I how to cook, how
to do our own laundry, how to clean the house PROPERLY, how to sew, how to bake
(well she taught my brother..I still can’t bake worth a damn…lol) and many other life lessons.
My mother would make sure that I was in church almost every
Sunday. She made sure that I was
involved at church (Jr. Usher board, etc).
She made sure to let me know that whatever I was/wasn’t doing at school,
“out in the streets as she would say”, that God was a forgiving God and to
always keep God first in my heart.
She always made sure to stress the importance of our
family. All of my cousins know this, and
most of them were more like brothers and sisters than cousins when we were
growing up.
My friends growing up use to think my mother was
mean/strict. I never saw my mother as
mean (well most of the time…lol)….. My mother simply kept her son’s in line, out of jail
and ALIVE! J
My mother was her mother…and sometimes I feel that I am my
mother in a lot of ways.
I realize that I’m all over the place here with my
words/thoughts/memories..but there is absolutely no way I could write
everything about the person that meant everything to me! I use to think she was joking when she would
tell me “boy, don’t yall come to visit me at my grave, because I won’t be
there”. After she got sick, and her
health took a turn for the worst…she whispered to me one day while visiting
her…”get right with God please, and don’t
come visit my grave cause I aint going to be there” and she smiled and tapped
me J. I knew then that she would soon be with God!
I hope that she’s looking down on me and beaming with pride
up there, because I am VERY proud to have called her my mother!
I miss you Mom/Gloria/Toogie!!
