Her children arise and call her blessed… (Proverbs 31:28 ESV)
This week marks a five-year anniversary. It is not my mother’s birthday or the anniversary of her death—it was five years ago that we were able to celebrate the six-month mark in my mother’s cancer journey. This was significant since her diagnosis threatened to take her life in just a few weeks. But we were able to have a party and celebrate with her before the cancer took over.
The idea to honor her came to me as I was cleaning up from my son’s 29th birthday party in early February. I would usually have had a small celebration for him at home, but my mother was diagnosed with brain cancer the previous August, so we decided to hold the event in the downstairs community room at Sunset Wood, the independent living community where my mother lived, to make it easier for her to attend.
Both sides of the family were invited to celebrate Paul’s birthday. I made a pot of chili, pulled pork, and a salad. We had a leisurely meal, and most of the local aunts, uncles, and cousins stopped in. We lingered all afternoon over coffee, cake, board games, and conversation. Even family members who didn’t usually come to family events showed up.
As I cleaned up the room afterward, still feeling the warmth and love of the family, I wondered what I could do to celebrate my mother before her cancer spread and it was too late. I had been blown away and inspired by how well my mother had taken her cancer diagnosis, and how well she was living with her illness.
On the day my mother was diagnosed, her doctor told us to expect anything—a stroke, loss of senses, or even sudden death. She said she didn’t expect Mom to live past Thanksgiving, and here we were, six months after her diagnosis, and she was still going relatively strong. On the day she was diagnosed, Mom said, “Now I will just have to thank God for each new day!” That is how she lived each day, though there were setbacks and discouragements, she pressed on. I felt like her positive attitude was such a beautiful legacy. I wanted to honor her in her presence while she could still understand and enjoy the moment.
My mother comes from a long line of larger-than-life historic characters. One was her great-great-grandfather, Parson William Brownlow, an outspoken Methodist minister and editor who became the first governor of Tennessee after the Civil War, and then a US Senator. His daughter, my mother’s great-grandmother, Susan Brownlow Sawyers Boynton, is known as a Civil War heroine. When she was a young widow with a baby, and a staunch supporter of the Union, she scared away Confederate soldiers at gunpoint who threatened to take down the Union flag from her parents’ home in Knoxville, Tennessee.
My mother’s mother, Dr. Lulu Violet Long, was a legend as well, though she didn’t make it into the history books. She left her teaching position during World War I and moved to Washington, DC, to work at the train station. After the war, she moved to Chicago and graduated from the National College of Chiropractic, then moved back to Shippensburg, PA, and set up a chiropractic practice while she helped her mother care for her father. After her father passed away, my grandmother married her beau, a wounded soldier she met when she volunteered at Walter Reed Hospital during the war. Grandma was forty at the time and moved to Arkansas and became the first licensed woman chiropractor in the state.
The path my mother chose was opposite her mother’s. She married her college sweetheart, a veteran seven years her senior, at the age of twenty before finishing college. While her husband was deployed during her first year of marriage, she finished her last semester of college and taught for one semester, and then, at a time when more and more women were choosing to work outside the home, she chose to be a homemaker and stay-at-home mom, spending decades raising her five children.
Our home was busy and chaotic as Mom encouraged us all to be involved in church, school, and community activities. Mom would sew Halloween costumes and outfits for school plays. She was a cub scout leader, an advisor for the district-wide youth program at our church, and a chaperone at a youth center in our church fellowship hall, to name a few.
While I was wiping down the tables and rearranging the chairs, I started thinking about how my mother had lived in the shadow of her mother. We were all so proud of our well-educated, professional grandmother who had many accomplishments worthy of praise. But so did my mother, though hers were not as valued by our society.
With no disrespect intended towards my grandmother, I clearly remember her later years. At the age of ninety, she finally gave up housekeeping in Russellville, Arkansas, where she had lived for almost fifty years, and moved to New York to be near her daughter and grandchildren. Grandma moved into an independent living community in the next town over. I was enrolled in community college, and I would visit her every week or two. When I visited, I would often joke with her, “Come on Grandma, only a few more years until a hundred; You can make it!”
Her answer was always the same: “No one should have to live this long!”
What a contrast from the attitude my mother had in her last days! “Now I will just have to thank God for each new day!”
By the time I turned off the lights and loaded the car, I had come up with a plan. I would hold a six-month celebration of Mom’s diagnosis to honor her.
I wanted this to be a special celebration for Mom, so I asked her to help me plan it. I was thrilled she agreed to the celebration. “Do you want to invite everyone from Sunset Wood? Or how about just your Bible study group? Any church friends? Deacon Becky and Chaplain Elizabeth? Anyone from hospice?” I asked. But she just wanted her family. My only regret was that I hadn’t thought of this sooner. It was such short notice that my three sisters and their children were not able to come.
Three weeks later, we ushered my mother down the elevator and walked with her into the community room decorated for a fancy banquet. Mom was greeted by my whole family—my husband, son, three daughters, son-in-law, and a boyfriend—my brother, his wife and two daughters, my in-laws, and my brother’s in-laws. We sat down to a meal catered by the chef at Sunset Wood that would rival any fine restaurant—Chicken Francaise with flourless chocolate cake for dessert—Mom’s favorite.
When we were done eating, I took Mom’s hand, got on her level, and shared some thoughts and memories. I finished with: “Mom, your positive attitude and life well-lived surpass any great achievement of your famous ancestors. You have inspired us and will go down in our family history as the one who lived well to the end.”
Mom looked around at each of her family members surrounding her and beamed.
Just four days later, her health took a drastic turn, resulting in her need for round-the-clock care. Struggling with pain and weakness, she continued to live each day with gratitude and grace until the Lord called her home six months later.