Happy Birthday Mom

She claims she is reading.  I think she is napping

 Today is Mom's 93rd birthday.  How lucky I am  to have been born to this remarkable woman.  She is spry and robust and stubborn.  Which is probably why she is spry and robust.  

Mom served in London during WW II.  She trained as a Nurse  before enlisting but since there was such a need for Physical Therapists at that time,  she took the extra training and served as a PT.   After the war she was taking courses at the U of R in Rochester and she met Dad there.  She took time off to have her family and then completed her education as a science teacher.  Triple professional.

She taught science for fifteen years.  She did not teach where her children went to school.  Her decision.  Instead she would drive 25 miles one way to teach in Wayland.  Those were the days before front wheel drive.  We had Ford Falcons back then.  Even though she had snow tires, there were mornings when she would get stuck or slide off the road.  The school bus would come along, pick her up and schlep her to school with the kids.  She would then give the keys to the janitor who would go out and dig her car out and bring it on in.  Apparently this happened frequently enough for her to be quite nonchalant about it.  "Oh it happened all the time." I never knew. 

Education and critical thinking were valued in our home.  Mom made sure we had lots of different experiences and one Thanksgiving we all went to New York City.  She lined up a host of activities including a Broadway Show; "Hair"  No prude, our mother.  I think Dad would have given it a miss.  Especially after the scene where the whole cast  appears on stage naked. 

Mom is keenly interested in everything.  She is a news junkie and reads the New York Times every morning on line.  She plays bridge with her friends and still drives (sigh).  She is fiercely independent and helps out her friends whenever she can.  When Dad died in 2004 I invited her to come live with me.  She said NO.  The expletive was missing, the sentiment was not.  I love her with all my heart and am proud to be her daughter.