Accidental Mothers

Mary Jane with Lucy's mom

LUCY BURDETTE: Some years ago, John and I went to a resort in the Poconos with a group of friends over Mother's Day weekend.  We played tennis and ate well, though the resort was well past its heyday and beginning to crumble. One of the nice touches was that all of the women received a rose for Mother's Day. No one asked whether we had biological children or stepchildren or grandchildren. The assumption was that all the women deserved a rose. And that got me thinking about how mothering figures come in many shapes and sizes. Sometimes in the shape of a teacher or a therapist  or a grandparent or neighbor or a sister, or even a father. I thought it might be interesting today to talk about a mother figure in our lives who is/was not our actual mother. (Though if you'd rather talk about your mother, that's fine too!) 

The photo I've shared is of my mother with her best friend Mary Jane, who was our next-door neighbor for many years when we kids were growing up. She had her own five children, but she was kind and welcoming to all of us as well. And many years later, after my mother and her husband had both died, she became my stepmother.  She was lots of fun and she opened her heart to my siblings and me, as she had when we were children. She loved to dance. I can remember so clearly the day we took MJ and my dad to see STRICTLY BALLROOM (a great upbeat movie, by the way!) As we came out of the theater, she turned to my father and said: “Throw away your cane, old man, and let’s dance!” It was pretty special to have a stepmother whom we'd known almost our whole lives, who had a shared history, and who had known my mother quite well.  So today I'd like to raise a teeny tiny glass of wine to Mary Jane (as we used to tease her, since she was a tiny person)…

How about you Reds? Who would you like to remember?

JENN MCKINLAY: When I first moved to Arizona, I was lucky enough to get a job working for the Phoenix Public Library system. One of the first people I met, who became a surrogate mom to me, was a woman named Cay Culbertson. She had short gray hair, glasses, and a laugh that barked out of her. And when you really made her laugh, she'd slap you on the back so hard she'd send you across the room. She had three grown children but she made room for me in her family, as well as anyone else who needed a mom. She took the time to meet everyone and get to know them, to make them feel welcome and that they belonged. She was a fierce protector of her people but had great humor and could laugh at herself, even when she locked herself out of her car for the millionth time. When she passed, it was a crushing blow that rippled through the library system and positively gutted all of us. The piece of advice she gave me that I hold most dear and frequently refer to was when her son, about thirty at the time, started to have seizures for no explicable reason. I asked her how she was dealing with the worry and she said, "Well, I turn it over to God and then ten minutes later I do it again." I'm not particularly religious, but I've never forgotten that or her and I never will.

Debs with Nanny and cousin Meredith

DEBORAH CROMBIE: I would raise that mothering glass to my grandmother, without a doubt. Lillian Lorraine Dozier, nee Jordan, mother of four, of whom my mom was the second eldest. To me, she was never anything but Nanny. Widowed during the Depression, she somehow managed to raise her kids, and somewhere along the way, when the kids were grown, she got a teaching certificate and left Texas for California. This is the part of her life about which I know so little, and sadly, all her children are gone now, so there's no one to ask. I do know that when I was born, she came back to Texas and moved in my family. We shared a room the first few years until my parents added a wing to the house for her. She was my primary caretaker, my best friend, my supporter, my counselor. She taught me to read and to be interested in everything. We planned world adventures with a globe and issues of National Geographic. She was fascinated by Egypt, but the longest journey I remember her taking was by train to a spa in Mineral Wells. I was with her when she died at eighty-six of congestive heart failure. It took me another ten years to write my first novel, but I was thinking of her, knowing she would be cheering me on. So, cheers to you, Nanny, and a dozen roses, too.

Hallie and her mother

HALLIE EPHRON: My mother, bless her heart, had barely a nurturing bone in her body. Somehow she ended up having four of us. Fortunately she and my father made a good living as screenwriters so we had help. World Class Help. The mothering I got was from the lovely Evelyn Hall, who worked for my family for more than 40 years, and Amelia James Evans who took care of me when I was little. They were smart and cozy and when you were with them you felt safe.

RHYS BOWEN: My own mother wasn't exactly the warm and cuddly type either. She worked from the moment I was born but I was raised by two wonderful women, my grandmother and great aunt. Nanny was soft and gentle and I don't ever remember her ever raising her voice. My great aunt Sarah Ann (known to the family as Min) was blind, extremely well-read and kept me occupied with stories she made up as well as books she remembered plus games of pretend in which I was always the heroine...fairy princess, good queen, and she was always the villain--evil fairy, bad queen, or poor old woman gathering sticks. She had a phenomenal memory and when she couldn't sleep she would recite whole Shakespeare plays to herself. My story-telling gene clearly came from her.

Hank and her mother

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Rhys, that is astonishing. Yes, indeed, you had wonderful teachers. As for my mom? Yeah, not so cuddly.  My mom was so smart, and very chic, and worldly and artistic--but I don't think I can remember a time when I was growing up that she said to me: good job, honey! (Is that fair?) One of her favorite comments was: "I'm not criticizing, I'm observing."  My Gramma Minnie, also not cuddly, was pretty great--she taught me to knit and crochet and type. Oh, on her Underwood typewriter that was in a kind of suitcase thing. I loved it, and used to type like mad, mostly copying the vocabulary words in Readers Digest.  But who I would remember is my mom, no question. You don't have to be cuddly to be formative. I think of her, and am grateful to her, every day.

INGRID THOFT: I’ve been wracking my brain trying to name some mother figures in my life, and I think I’m coming up empty because I hit the lottery in the mother department.  I really can’t say enough good things about my mom; being her daughter is one of the greatest blessings of my life.  One of the many things I love about her is her sense of adventure.  She is extremely curious and loves to travel and learn about other cultures.  She traveled to the Soviet Union when it was the Soviet Union and to India.  More recently, we’ve been to Vietnam, Greece, Turkey, and just over a year ago, we traveled to Spain, just the two of us.  We rented a car and drove through the south of Spain, which was exciting and occasionally nerve-wracking.  One afternoon, we found ourselves inching our car down the circular tunnel of an underground parking garage in Ronda.  The walls were so close, we contemplated that it might be our final resting place!  We survived with another great travel story to add to our repertoire!

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Ingrid, we hit the same lottery - my mother has been cuddly when I needed it and a boot in the butt when I needed that. I was also fortunate to have three very different, very influential grandmothers: Grandma Greuling, Grandmother Spencer and Grandma Fleming. The former, my mother's mother, was twig-thin, highly opinionated, sharp as a tack and enormously house-proud. It's because of her I live in a 200 year-old-house. 

Grandmother Spencer, also known as Spencie and Maw Maw, was my southern grandma, plump and soft as a featherbed, who read her bible every evening and would set tables groaning with the most amazing southern food. No matter how old she got, she always took great care with her appearance; hat, shoes and bag, powder and lipstick. When you look at me, you can see her - I won the Spencer side in the gene pool. 

My Grandma Fleming came into my life when I was in my early teens, moving close to our house after my folks got married. I would stop by after school for cookies and to tell her how my life was going that day. She was an excellent audience for a dramatic teen, a combination of sympathetic and no-nonsense. I created a character modeled on her in my novels - Russ Van Alstyne's mother Margy.

Jungle reds, tell us about a mothering figure in your life!