Life Without Mother

In the nearly two years that followed Mothers’ death we had a series of housekeepers. None really did much more than keep house and watch the younger kids who weren’t in school. Our first, after Mother died, was a young import, Vera from Holland, who spoke almost no English, drank beer all day and wore spike heels with short shorts and tight spandex tops. She didn't even try to keep house. She would give us money and tell us to go to the Quick Shop, about a mile away and buy her cigarettes and “pils”. Back then we could buy the cigarettes for her and sometimes even the beer. Not much of a cook either; once she made us scrambled eggs and she put lettuce in with the eggs. I’m not sure of her longevity at our house but she was gone quite abruptly after my sister and I found her in her underwear, passed out on my dad's bed. Dad was there, too, so I was sure her "crime" wasn't trespassing.

Up until the day my mother died our life had been somewhat chaotic but very normal. Now things were upended. For a time Shirley Robinson helped as much as she could, given the fact that she had 9 kids of her own. Then we settled into a time of chronic uncertainty. Liz and I were tasked to “help out” not knowing what that actually meant. For me I had no guidance and no instincts to tell me how to help out. Liz was a little better at it but as a 15 year old with puberty setting in, I’m not sure she knew exactly how to be a substitute mom for the brood. We never had a serious conversation or family meeting to decide what to do or how to do it. We were not that deep.

My two youngest brothers probably suffered the ill effects of being motherless as time went by. Dad worked a lot at the Ford plant. When he was there he wasn't really there the way we needed him to be. Carl and Don were left alone so much, pushed off into the playpen to sit in their dirty diapers, forgotten until someone came along and noticed the smell. There was no conscious care and concern for their well-being. Where there had been warmth and tenderness one day, there was now next to none. But Dad did keep the family together.

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