MAMA MILLIE MOMENTS #8

Today, I would like to share two situations that come into my mind about my MAMA MILLIE.Whenever, I think of my mother I always think of her determination to do a job. In our city, there is a plant that has these large trees located on it's outside grounds. This particular place was where my parents patiently collected nuts for Mama to bake her famous nut roll cookies. This sounds easy, but the hard part of this activity was shelling these nuts. These were hickory nuts. They are tiny and very time consuming to shell. once my parents collected these nuts, they were like an assembly line getting as much of nut for future baking. This would drive me "nuts" as this was like using a tweaser to remove a splinter,that so small. Can you imagine how many nuts you would need to make over 10 dozen cookies? My parents were like squirrels storing food for the winter. Both of my parents are deceased. Whenever, I drive near these old hickory trees, I visualize seeing my parents with buckets collecting these "pieces of Gold". No matter how long this "nut hunting"took, it was an activity done without stopping. Death of a loved one takes the body. It doesn't take the memory that we have of that person. In order to survive facing death, concentrating on the spirit, memories,of our loved ones, is what can get us through a loss. Death has power, we need to strive to take that power away as Death cannot take away our memories of the person we lost. If we allow Death to overshadow our precious and some not so precious memories, we will struggle and Death is or can overshadow the memory that God has nurtured and we do an injustice to our deceased person who gave us moments that can't be eliminated unless we allow Death to consume us from going on with life. Hold onto your memories, live as those we lost would want for us.


Have you ever known of someone that if you told them to do something they wouldn't deviate? Mama Millie, had some health issues. Mother's doctor encouraged her to walk. Sounds good. Well from Monday through Friday, Mama Millie would get up at 4 a.m. and leave the house no later than 6 a.m. and go to a local walking track. She would complete 10 laps equal to 3 miles a day. I, don't think my mother's doctor meant mother to do this daily ritual. Many times, it was dark and there weren't any other people walking. Mother lost weight and to change her walking schedule, we talked to her Doctor and he in turn gave Mother a suggested walking schedule. If we hadn't talked to the Doctor, we wouldn't be able to change mother's schedule. Mother was like a "locomotive", once she started she wouldn't change her schedule, although we cautioned her about safety issues. Mother eventually had to give up this routine as she became ill. The gist of this story is that Mother was better than I at exercising, but that I was less stubborn and guess lazy. When I think of my Mother, I think that she was a "tough old bird",stronger than people her age as well as myself.