I was 20 years old when I learned I was going to have my 1st baby. The year was 1972. It was back before home pregnancy tests, so you learned you were with child a little later in the process.  Along about the 2nd month, you felt sick. I would have sworn that if anyone looked at me, they would ask, “Why are you green?” The old expression was, “The rabbit died.” It had something to do with the urine test you could take long after you were pretty sure you were pregnant.

I felt green my entire pregnancy, but that didn’t stop me from wearing the cute maternity tops my husband’s mother made for me. I was only 3 months along when I just HAD to wear them. Let’s just say I had plenty of room to grow. Wearing maternity clothes before you need them is not a good idea. I was sick of them by the 5th month, but it was too late to go back to regular clothes. I was locked into wearing oversized pants and blouses for what felt like an eternity. Of course, nowadays, there is no such thing as maternity wear.

I’ll never forget the night I went into labor. I had 2 books that told me everything I needed to know about labor, birth, and all things having to do with bringing a new bundle of joy into the world. I woke up at about 1:00 in the morning with a pain that started in my back and made its way to the front. I got up and grabbed a book. It said whenever the pains were 20 minutes apart, it was time to head for the hospital. I hadn’t really factured in that the hospital was an hour away. The problem was that my pains were never more than 10 minutes apart. I grabbed the other book and gave it to my husband. “See if it says anything about labor pains that are only 10 minutes apart. Do they spread out?” I asked.

After we had both finished reading, we decided it was time to go! So what if we were a little bit early.

Somewhere between Vivian and Pierre where the hospital was, I’d had enough of the 10 minutes apart labor pains and told my husband to STEP ON IT!  The upshot of that was we ended up being escorted to the hospital by a very understanding policeman who had his flashing light red light on. He told us to follow him!

Because of the nice policeman, we made it to the hospital in plenty of time. I gave birth to a beautiful 7 lb 2 oz baby boy. Oh, that’s another thing. There was no way of knowing in advance if your bundle of joy was going to be a boy or a girl, and the daddy was not allowed in the delivery room. My how times have changed in the last 50 years. My son is now 51 and still his mother’s pride and joy. I had another little bundle of joy 5 years later, and I was also blessed along the way with 2 beautiful daughters through my marriage to Kip. My heart is full.

Almost 43 years ago.

Shortly after we moved to Texas in 1987, we got a visit from my mother. She told us she had gotten a letter from her brother, my Uncle Jeff. He said their mother’s sister, Grace, lived in Texas. None of the family had ever met her.

My Grandma Sanderson grew up in Iowa. She was from a fairly well to do family, which included 13 children. Grandpa spotted Grandma when she was singing in the church choir. They married and moved to South Dakota when she was the ripe old age of 28. Aunt Grace was 13 years younger than Grandma, and they would have only seen each other the few times that Grandma and Grandpa paid visits to Iowa.

Anyway, Mom insisted we pay her Aunt Grace a visit. We ended up spending a lovely afternoon with her. She commented that she didn’t remember her sister well. She sounded just like Grandma and was somewhat of a spitfire like Grandma was. She was small in stature and we thought it was cute that she kept her little flats on with rubber bands.

She had taped several family pictures on the wall and proudly went through each person’s story. She had lived through the deaths of her husband and both of her kids. The only family she had left was a grandson who treated her very well.

Kip and I visited Aunt Grace several times over the next year. She loved to go to Luby’s Cafeteria for Sunday lunch. One Sunday, we were going to try someplace different, and she seemed so disappointed we turned around and went to Luby’s. On Easter Sunday, they had a lady playing the piano, and Aunt Grace thoroughly enjoyed that.

A couple of weeks before Thanksgiving, I started to try to reach Aunt Grace by phone to see if we could come and get her and bring her to our house for Thanksgiving dinner. She never answered. One evening, we drove over to her apartment and knocked on the door. A neighbor heard us and came out to tell us Aunt Grace had passed away. She gave us the number for her grandson. We called him, and he told us she had passed away peacefully in her sleep. He had thought about calling us, but didn’t have our number. He thanked us for taking her to Luby’s on so many occasions and said she talked about it all the time. She especially talked about the piano player. We, in turn, had heard really good things about him.

Yes, she was a little spitfire. She used to ride the bus to get her groceries and she was so little, one day the wind got ahold of her as she grabbed onto the door and she said it blew her straight out. She said she was flying and she feared she would lose her shoes. She said she went back home and waited for the wind to die down.

We Sanderson kids were really close our grandparents. It was so much fun getting to know Grandma’s little sister here in Texas. What fond memories. Family is everything.

Mom (Loretta with Aunt Grace)

I joined a few friends for lunch the other day, and as is normal for ladies who are 70ish, the conversation quickly centered around medical issues. My thoughts went to a phone conversation I had years before with my mother. She went down the line of several medications she had tried out in hopes of relieving her constipation. Since I was only in my early 40s, I quickly became bored with the topic and tried to change the subject. Mom said I sounded like I was bound up, and I should try 3 tablespoons of Metamucil in a cup of water.

It was quite an experience to have a phone conversation with my mother. She was not well versed in telephone etiquette. When she was done talking, she just simply hung up. There were no goodbyes. She never said, “I’ll talk to you later,” or, “Have a nice day.”

I’ve been thinking about my mother a lot lately. Her birthday is on May 6th, and it was always just a few days before Mother’s Day. I got her a lot of gifts that were combined Mother’s Day and Birthday gifts feeling it was only fair since my birthday is a week after Christmas and I received a lot of joint presents.

Mom was actually quite fun to grow up with. She was funny and spontaneous. There was never a dull moment around our house. She had no filter, so we never had to wonder what she was thinking. I once had a date with a basketball player and when he came to pick me up, she said she didn’t recognize him with all his clothes on, meaning she was used to seeing him in a basketball uniform. I was so used to her that I didn’t even get embarrassed, but I think he did.

I could go on forever recalling Loretta funnies that always make me smile. She was a good Mom in a different kind of way. She taught me a lot of very useful things that I have relied upon in my adult life. When I had cancer, I asked myself, “What would Mom do?” The answer was she would have tried to brush it off like a pesky fly. Although, we all know it’s usually not that easy.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the valiant moms out there. It’s not an easy job, but no job in this world is more important.

I love photographs. I can look at them for hours. I just spent the day going through boxes of old pictures. It was an emotional experience for sure. All those moments frozen in time. Impish grins of little children long since grown up. Snapshots of times deemed important by the one who captured the moment.

It’s kind of sad that my printed photos stopped at the time digital cameras came on the scene. Now, all my pictures are living in a cloud somewhere. I email and text the good ones to people I think might enjoy seeing them, but more often than not, my captures are never looked at again. It might be different for you. I’d like to know how many people out there still print the special ones…the birthdays and graduations. How many organize their photos in special folders, and then go back and actually look at them again. I hope you do. I’m not that well organized. I see a picture in my mind, but going back and finding it is usually a lost cause. It makes me a little sad.

My cousin, Andrea sent me some photographs she found in a box of things her mother had retrieved from Grandpa Sanderson’s house after he died. There were pictures of my kids that I had sent to him over the years, a picture of my brother, Billy and me with Grandpa, and one of my mom when she was 19.

They were all fun to look at and reminisce about. Fond memories and stories came flooding back. In one picture of my son, Mason, he was holding what he called his dangerous gun. In another, he is holding his little brother so tight it looks like he might burst. I especially remember that special day at the cabin. All the relatives were there to celebrate Grandpa’s 90th birthday. My brother came all the way from California. I tease him that he looked like Elvis Presley’s long lost cousin with his sideburns. The picture of Mom standing in front of the Texaco bulk truck brought back stories of her driving it a few times to deliver fuel when she worked at the Texaco Station for Ray and Pearl Schultz. I seem to remember she got pulled over by the police for speeding.

You can imagine how long it takes me to go through a whole box of pictures. I could get lost for years in the cloud.