My mom had a heart for the disadvantaged. I’m sure her faith had something to do with it, but I think she just loved everyone. I recall two people my mom reached out to when we were children. Our grandmother commented once, “Your momma always loved strays and that can be people as well as animals.”
In the first instance, there was a woman we called German Lily. She was, of course, from Germany and spoke very little English. She looked like one of those pictures in a History channel special on the aftermath of World War II but she had immigrated to the U.S. She wore a long woolen midnight blue winter coat and a babuska. A babuska is a scarf that women wore over their head and tied under the chin. They were folded in half, which made them look like triangles with the long side over the forehead and hair and opposite point down the back of the neck. I don’t know this woman’s story other than she lived in a trailer with her daughter and our mom would go visit her. And for some reason, the woman and her daughter moved in with us on the farm. She brought a goat with her and a recipe for corn meal mush. The goat milk had a potent smell, but tasted good once you got used to it. But I hated the corn meal mush. After German Lily came to be with us, we had this mush every morning for breakfast. I tried to dress it up with jellies or brown sugar, but no matter what we did, it continued to taste horrible.
A more enduring recollection comes later when we lived on Middle Street in North Braddock. There was what we children referred to as a baglady by the name of Winnie that visited the neighborhood and whoever would feed her or give her money. As she came up the brick street, she carried a sturdy brown grocery bag with thin string-cord handles and all sorts of strange items in the bag. The items were usually things she purchased at the “dirty” store. This was the nickname given to Goodwill’s or Salvation Army stores that carried only used merchandise. Occasionally, she’d push a Kroger’s grocery cart with several bags of belongings. As far as appearance, she wore a colorful dress and a hat that predates Mary Poppins. I remember her stockings rolled down to just above her ankles and hairy legs that just grossed me out. Some older women have gray leg hairs when they get older, imagine that. She had a kind of wobble to her walk that was probably due to arthritis. It made me think of swashbuckler movies where one of the pirates has a pegleg and leans back and forth as he walks. But regardless of her gait and motion as she walked, she tried to be the picture of fashion.
When Winnie came for a visit, it was usually for two things, food and money. “Ruthie, you got anything to eat? That was the easier of the two requests for my mom to comply with. “Ruthie, can you spare a couple of shekels? I needs money, sweetheart.” What struck me with the second request was how respectful my mom was to this woman. We had just moved into this neighborhood after losing the farm. My dad was working part-time for minimum wage at a paint store in Braddock. We were receiving CARE packages of powdered eggs, powdered milk, peanut butter and lentils. This is before welfare and food-stamps as we commonly think of it now. So, giving away our food was a big enough deal let alone money. But mom always found a few nickels or dimes to give to Winnie. She used the scriptures saying, “if you’re going to give, give cheerfully.” Also, with mom having been born in the beginning of the economic Depression, she was aware that a person’s circumstance wasn’t always a result of their own poor choices. She’d also make the comment, “But for the grace of God, go I.”
The first couple of hours would go very well. My mom would brew a fresh pot of coffee, which delighted Winnie to no end. She’d ask for a second and third cup and my mom would happily oblige. There was peanut-butter toast for the main course and jam or jelly if we had any. Mom would just “love on” this woman.
Now there was only one problem. When Winnie paid my mom a visit, she’d come and it seemed like she’d never leave. So, the warmth, hospitality and patience my mom had in the first several hours began to wane around the four to five hour mark. Mom was always gracious and would gradually give Winnie hints that it was time for the visit to conclude. Mom would begin to stand rather than sit at the kitchen table and start cleaning up dishes or folding laundry. Most of the time, Winnie would get the hint. She’d ask for a last piece of toast or a last cup of coffee called “one for the road.” Sometimes, Winnie would try to stay longer and mom would have to be more direct. “Winnie, honey, its time to go. I’ve got children to look after here and dinner to make.” Once Winnie gave into the notion that their visit was ending, she and my mom would go through their goodbye ritual. The ritual included Winnie trying to find ways to prolong the visit, remembering important things she forgot to tell our mom or questions she wanted our mom to slowly ponder and answer. This would go on from the time Winnie stood up from the kitchen table, made her way to the doorway onto the porch and onto the sidewalk in front of the house. This was Winnie’s way of saying, “I don’t want this to end. I don’t want to leave. I want to stay here longer.” Once in a while, my mom wasn’t up to Winnie visiting and would have one of us children answer the door and lie to Winnie. We’d ask, “Mom, what do you want us to say?” Mom replied, “Just tell her I’m at your grandmothers.” Winnie’d ask, “is your mom home?” One of us would reply, “No, she’s visiting our grandmother up in First Ward.” One time, our mom must not have got out of the living room where the door and picture window is located fast enough and Winnie knew we were lying. When we said mom was not home, Winnie retorted, “I knows she’s in there. I justs wants to see her for a minute. Just a minute.” But we were given explicit instructions not to acknowledge our mom was home and we continued to protect our mom from Winnie’s intrusion and unexpected visit.
What I remember most as a nine or ten-year old boy was my mom’s warmth extended to those who for whatever circumstances go without love. She shouldn’t have made us lie to Winnie, but her insufficiency doesn’t lessen the impact it had on her children.
The Heart of the Matta 