This week I want to share an article I wrote more than 30 years ago! Yes, this is in honor of my mother, Zena Rumage who passed away in 1988. I had a call from Mr. Doug Morris who was the publisher of Morgan County News at that time. This call was made on a Tuesday morning when we were on ‘deadline’ for that week’s paper which would be printed on Wednesday. He was asking me to write an article about my mother. Since Judy Byrge, our editor, was in agreement, I hurriedly wrote the following article.
“Mother’s Pot of Knowledge”
I spend a lot of time now thinking about things from the past and trying in various ways to search out my life and soul in order to find out why I am like I am and what caused me to be that way.
There has been no professional schooling that I can give credit (or blame) to for having influenced me to be what I am.
Mostly for all the good in my life I give credit to my mother, who was such a great example of overcoming hardships and applying ourselves to hard work.
I still draw from that ‘pot of learning’ that she left behind.
I recall the huge pot where Mother boiled our clothes on wash day.
I recall another pot where she cooked black-eyed peas on a ‘wood’ stove, and I recall other large pots that she used when canning and preserving food for our family.
Mostly, now, I think about the invisible ‘pot of knowledge’ that she had when giving instructions to her children and grandchildren. It seemed her teachings on right living was always based on the Bible. I used to wonder if she wrote the book of Proverbs because of her readily quoting it to us to make a point or to prove what she was advising us to do.
I remember her telling us that she was only 14 when her mother had died.
She often spoke of the hardships of helping raise seven younger brothers and sisters.
She also vividly told that she was saved when she was 16 years old at a small church during a revival near her home. The hardship stories and the one of her salvation were two events that she mentioned frequently.
Mother often spoke of running up to Grandma’s house when a problem arose that she could not handle.
There again that ‘pot of learning’ was available from a grandmother!
In looking back, I am amazed that Mother knew just how much of everything she used in cooking for us. She had no recipe book but was a wonderful cook!
She stored the knowledge in her mind on how to cook everything from apple pie to making hominy! I vividly remember how she would take left over biscuits (homemade of course) and fry them in hot molasses and butter! mmm, Molasses Stickers! (Naturally, Mother had raised the sorghum cane to make the molasses and milked the cow and churned the butter.)
Mother’s “Pot of Knowledge” included skills for survival and saving for the future, but she made the best of each day.
I watched her face hardships and problems and for most of the time, she held on to an invisible faith that things would someday be better.
I have had to go to her ‘pot of learning’ for help and instruction so many times. One would think it would be depleted.
However, Mother’s ‘pot of instructions’ is still full though she is gone.
It seems that as I grow older I realize I have failed to give my children and grandchildren as much as my Mother gave me.
Our lifestyle is so different now but the truth and values that Mother had in her ‘pot’ are just as needful today as then.
To sum this up, I am reminded that Mother’s teaching and instructions came from the Proverbs in the Bible and they will never fail us.
When Mother passed away, we children chose one of these Proverbs for an inscription on her grave marker, “Her children rise up and call her blessed.”
Would you share a rose (whether red or white) this Mother’s Day, in memory and thankfulness for your Mother?
