Episode 28: With Mom, aka Laurie (On Teaching, Single-Parenting, Maintaining Joy and Wonder, Divorce, Sorting Through Boxes, and Solitude)
Welcome back to Jonah Asks.
Well…I did it. I interviewed my Mom. Deep in my gut, I knew I needed to do this interview when I started the project…and I waited seven months and 27 episodes because I knew it would be complicated.
I love my mom. I appreciate what my mom did for us growing up. Our relationship has never been simple. Childhood was often tense and anxious and life was difficult for Mom. Teaching second grade and raising two young boys on her own was difficult. Mom balanced our home life with teaching and also being involved in our schools in Arlington and remaining involved in the school system where she taught, in Newton. A strong individual, Mom is now Grammy on Zoom, still doing aerobics (on Zoom these days) at 75 years-old, and still sorting through her endless boxes.
This interview was an important and cathartic one for me, and she thought it came out pretty well, though “a bit rambly.” I reminded her it was a conversation, not an outline.
Topics we discuss:
*education
*teaching philosophy (focusing on individual traits in order to encourage and support learning of each student)
*asking for support (or not)
*routines
*writing
*childhood memories — Washington DC suburbs in the 1940s and early 1950s
*Helen and Earl (mom’s parents/my grandparents)
*maintaining joy, wonder and delight
*meeting my father in college
*getting married and divorced
*single-parenting
*choosing NOT to remarry
*the pleasure of sorting
*relationship conflict
*divorce and children: psychology
*family dynamics after divorce
*appreciations
Opening
Mom is a focused and deliberate learner. Mom was a devoted daughter.
Mom’s mentor and school principal where she taught in Newton, Massachusetts for over 30 years, was Cam Nadeau. Cam’s wisdom (principal of the elementary school where Mom taught)
“Find something in this child that you really like, and focus on that.”
Mom has thought about that quote throughout the various relationships with people in her life.
0:05 Asking for Support
Asking for support is not something Mom often does. After the divorce in 1981, Mom needed support. Ben was 5 and I was 18 months old. Friends Mom was supported by during that time: Cam, her friends and colleagues Alex and Maril, and her neighbor and friend, Sandy.
Reva — our cousin — came to live with us for a year after the divorce. Mom didn’t ask Reva. Reva came up with the plan in part because she wanted to do an internship in Boston.
0:09 Mom’s Morning Routine
Coffee at Quebrada. Email. Toast and cheese with the Boston Globe.
0:11 The End of a Dedicated 35-Year Teaching Career
Mom was a second-grade teacher for 35 years. The principal that replaced Cam gave Mom a “Less-than-Satisfactory” review, without warning, in 1998. Mom retired two years after the review, as soon as she was eligible. She had been teaching since 1967.
0:15 Dedication
Mom has dedicated her life to teaching, mothering, being a good friend, daughter, sister and person.
A parenting quote from Mom:
“It’s the hardest job you’ll ever love.”
Jonah appreciates Mom, but uses a word, “sacrifice,” that Mom doesn’t necessarily agree with.
Mom: “I haven’t ever felt that I’ve sacrificed myself. I felt there were times that were exhausting. I remember saying, ‘Okay, what’s in it for me is clean hair and aerobics. That’s it. But that was okay. That was the time period, but I never felt…I don’t know what the term sacrifice actually means.”
Jonah defines sacrifice, broadly as “Everything you do that’s not for you.”
0:20 Writing
Mom wrote for her college literary magazine and later, stream-of-consciousness poems in the form of Valentine’s updates. She sent out close to a hundred, maybe more, copies of the Valentine’s Day Poem, and individual notes to each person on the back.
During college, Mom attended a writer’s conference/workshop at Breadloaf, in Middlebury, Vermont.
0:25 Growing Up: Mom’s Childhood
Poppadaddy and Lynma — mom’s father, Earl, and mom’s mother, Helen.
Q. How would you characterize your mom and dad, thinking about your childhood?
“My mother was effervescent. She was bubbly. She loved life and living and adventures and trying new things and meeting new people. My dad was very cerebral, but he always said, ‘Life was more fun with her.”
“My friend invited me to a lecture. Jerome Kagan was giving a lecture on siblings, birth order and personalities. He talked about first-borns, partly because they were alone and with adults, that first-borns were always trying to reach something they couldn’t cognitively reach because of the time with adults. Second and third kids had much more freedom to try out different things, because what was in front of them was looser.”
0:32 Scenes from Childhood
“Both of my parents had similar expectations for both of us. I remember scenes from when I was younger. I don’t remember any specific pressures. I remember a Christmas tree and I remember getting a baby carriage for my doll.
Before the family moved to Arlington, Virginia they lived in a garden apartment in Falls Church, Virginia. Mom wonders about walking to school the six blocks. The neighborhood kids walked together.
Howdy-Doody
“We had the first television on the block. Black-and-white. Howdy-Doody. The neighborhood kids came over. We ate carrots. December, 1947. I was three years old.”
0:38 The First Color Television
Moving to Arlington, Virginia, a D.C. suburb. A new development. Mom was seven. Mary Martin’s Peter Pan, Color Televised Musical. 1954.
Q. Did you grow up?
“I remember one day when you and Ben had come back from summer camp and you were just coated in dust and dirt. I said, “Okay, strip down here. Into the bathtub and fudgsicles for dinner.” Being able to do that kind of thing is part of who I am.”
0:42 Maintaining Joy and Wonder
We discuss the importance of nourishing creativity and keeping yourself spontaneous, or doing something for yourself that is silly or creative. Some people lose the capacity for joy and wonder.
Jonah: “As an adult, you have to work at being a child. Having a child of your own helps.”
Mom: “I would use the terms — ‘Focusing on finding joy and delight.”
0:47 Laurie Meets Dan
Meeting in a Harvard Gilbert & Sullivan musical. They were both in the chorus. Laurie was a junior. Dan was a sophomore. Mom enjoyed meeting people through the musicals. It was easier, less pressure than going to “mixers.” Laurie and Dan got married when they were 23 and 22 in 1968.
0:59 Vietnam War and the Draft: a Precipitating Event, Laurie and Dan Get Married — 1968
Taking time away from school, Dan enlisted in the army so he wouldn’t get drafted. He was sent to Monterey, CA to learn Russian. They got married when he was in the army in 1968.
1:04 Decompression: Laughter Needed
Jonah recalls laughing with Mom and Ben and realizing how badly we all needed to laugh to break the tension in the house. Seinfeld and Friends on Thursday nights helped.
1:06 Square Dancing Boyfriends, Not Marrying Again
Mom had a few boyfriends in the 80s, but she didn’t see any as marriage material. Nobody ever moved into our house. Jonah asks about what those situations were like, and wonders if Mom was open to remarrying.
1:11 Mom Loves Sorting
Mom has a sentimental attachment to the objects of the past. Mom likes her peaceful, quiet time. She finds it soothing. “The Boxes.” Mom enjoys quietly sorting through her boxes.
1:18 Living Alone at an Older Age
Jonah mentions how Mom is approaching an age where living alone in a big house might become an issue. Mom brings up an old family friend’s anecdote about marriage: “I always said, ‘For better or for worse…but not for lunch.”
1:25 Silence After the Divorce
Jonah discusses the weight of the silence, the gulf between his two parents. Mom expresses that she was disappointed and depressed, but Dan was very angry.
“If we didn’t talk, then we wouldn’t have those clashes. During the divorce, when we were working with the social worker, separate from the counseling, we were told the most important thing is that kids in a divorce feel they’re truly loved by both parents.
I felt he would love you. I knew I would love you, and…whenever there was communication, it was so negative that, when the divorce was set up, it was agreed that we would not talk to each other. During the divorce, we did not talk to each other. The lawyers talked to each other. We didn’t.
I was sad and depressed and overwhelmed, but I wasn’t angry. He was angry. It was all coming at me. We didn’t talk for 13 years. I remember it was 13 years because when Ben graduated from high school, he and Peg came to the graduation and we had lobsters. That was the first social interaction time that was okay. 1994.”
1:33 Individual Strength and Self-Empowerment
Jonah discusses his view of how we build character and develop self-empowerment, as children…often formed through adversity and being outside of our comfort zones.
1:36 Helen and Earl: Resolving Conflict Through a Kiss and a Hug
Mom mentions her parents resolving conflict. Helen and Earl, when arguing on the other side of the room, he came over to her and gave her a hug and a kiss and they reconciled. Maybe the physical touch reminded Helen that whatever they were going through was temporary and less important than recognizing each other and their love.
Appreciations
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Thanks for listening. Life is messy. Being a child isn’t easy. Neither is being a parent. Have compassion for both.
Stay Safe and Enjoy the Springtime,
Jonah