To make her outside work easier, an automatic sprinkling system was installed in the yard. She loved the garden, her flowers blooming like a smile across a child’s face. She preferred digging outside in the dirt, rather than doing mundane chores inside. I see her now with jeans, a long sleeved man’s shirt and a wide brimmed hat as she weeded vegetables and her prized rose garden. For the next fifteen years she mowed her own lawn, tilled the garden, planted, watered and then picked and canned apricots, peaches, cucumbers, tomatoes, beans and potatoes. Even in her seventies she worked circles around daughters and granddaughters.
Although I worried about her making this move from rural life to city life, she adapted to her new home as easily as the plants she dug up, loaded into the moving van, and planted in her new garden some 500 miles away. I also wondered how she and her sister Jessie would get along, as these two sisters never out grew their sibling rivalry. Now they would be living near each other and I questioned Mom about it one day over the phone. She replied, “Oh we will get along okay until Jessie gets mad, and then she will have to get glad again, just like when we were kids.”
We hung up and a flood of memories returned. Mom liked to tell about growing up in a large family of six boys and four girls, with lots of sibling rivalry and how she longed for more love and attention...She was a "Tom Boy" and found that playing baseball and fishing with the boys, brought her the attention she craved...Later in life, she was able to put most of that behind her and enjoyed yearly reunions and a big highlight was a 3 week trip to Europe that Aunt Lavinia planned and paid for and asked her 3 sisters to join her...The Parkin family reunion was started in the 50's and continued into the 90's, with sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles and cousins attending...Mom and Aunt Jessie could still get "snippy" with each other. (to be continued)...Hugs to All...OWAV:)
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