I Remember Mama by Marianne Stephens

I Remember Mama was the  title of an old TV show in the 50's. And yes, I know that Mother's Day has passed. But that doesn't stop people from remembering their mothers.

I miss my mother every single day. I find myself thinking, "What would mom think about this?"

Mom lived with us for 10 years. We created an apartment in our home for her. Things went well until Dementia took over. Suddenly I had a mother I didn't recognize; one who swore, couldn't remember anything.

With tons of guilty feelings, we put mom in a nursing home dedicated to helping those with dementia and Alzheimers She got great care, but I still felt guilty.

I can laugh now at some of the things she did as dementia took over:
Talking on the phone to a cousin - without a phone. I told her to hang up so we could talk.
Watching a Christmas parade outside her window...in summer while she looked at a parking lot.
Telling me "You lied to me. It's not April. Shut up and drive." I'd gone to get her for a home visit for Thanksgiving. We weren't even out of the parking lot. That was the last time I tried to bring her home. 
Telling me that my brother lived in the nursing home basement and was chasing the nurses. Boy, was she angry at him! And, his band played at the nursing home...and my then 3 year-old grandson sang with the band - in Italian.

It was sad to see her fade away. On my birthday in 2015, she held a stuffed bear wrapped in a blanket and called it her baby. I had to hold it so she would eat lunch.

There were lucid episodes, and I am grateful for those. She loved music and I'd dance with her when a band came and played songs from the 40's and 50's. 

After she passed away in Jan. 2016, my brother, sister, and I went through some of her things at my house. Tucked away in an envelope we found three letters....one for each of us. They all began the same:
"YOU WERE MY FAVORITE BECAUSE..."

These had been written long before dementia kicked in. How special she made each of us feel.
On her headstone at the cemetery, we wrote "Favorite Mother".

Yes, I remember mama for so many reasons!

What is your fondest memory of your mom/stepmom/godmother/any woman who helped raise you?

Marianne 

http://www.mariannestephens.net
http://www.romancebooks4us.com

It's All About the Mom #MothersDay #RB4U #melissa_keir

It's All About the Mom

Welcome! Mother's Day is approaching and children all over the United States will be bringing their mothers breakfast in bed along with beautiful hand drawn photos of a smiling mom. A Hallmark moment for sure....But do you remember a TV show from the 90's where the catch phrase was "Not the Mama?"

Jim Henson dreamed up and Disney made the show happen. It was a weekly prime time comedy about a blue-collar family of dinosaurs who lived in an alternate reality where dinosaurs were never extinct. The family featured a father, mother, teenage son and daughter, aged mother-in-law and cute small baby dinosaur. 

The cute baby loved to hit the father (or anyone else) with a frying pan and scream "Not the Mama" to the delight of the audience. As mother's know, sometimes your child only wants you and no one else will do.

Even when you are an adult....

Now that another Mother's Day is practically upon us, I spend a great deal of time reminiscing about my mom. She's been gone for twenty years. She missed so much...her children and grandchildren have grown, gotten married, and had many celebrations without her. (although she was always in our hearts)

This year, I've felt closer to her as I worked to get her novel published. She had a dream in the early 80's and wrote a sweeping love story about a fiery young woman and the undercover spy who was trying to stop the gunrunning after the Civil War. (Available in ebook and print- Amazon)

I was excited to be able to bring her dream of becoming a published author to reality. But there are still times when I miss her and would give almost anything to spend time with her, sharing all she missed, especially as we celebrate our moms.

If you are lucky to have a mom still in your life, be sure to give her a hug, a flower or breakfast in bed. And if your mom has passed, like mine, spend some time on this holiday celebrating her memory. 

Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers and the "Not the Mamas"

Until next month,

Melissa Keir

www.melissakeir.com

Happy Mother's Day - by Marianne Stephens

Wishing all a very happy day! Share fun and laughter with your mother/grandmother/kids...or have comforting, fond memories of mothers who've passed away.

My mother was always proud of me, no matter what I did. As the first girl to go to college on either side of my large, Italian family, she beamed with joy and told everyone about her daughter, the teacher.

When I started writing romance books, she was happy for my success and wanted copies of my books. I gave her signed copies...but not of my erotic romances! That was my decision since I knew she'd never read them. She read the others, and also had copies of my nonfiction books.

Watching her age and slip into dementia wasn't enjoyable and saddened me. I cared for her as long as I could, but when she needed 24/7 care, the decision was made to place her in a nursing home. 

For 2 1/2 years, I followed her lead in whatever she wanted to talk about...real and unreal. I was "in her world" whenever I visited her. I laughed and cried at  times, but was grateful for her long life. I miss her all the time, but have wonderful memories to console me. 

I'll celebrate Mother's Day at a baseball game this year. Already received gifts from my kids and will talk to them on Sunday.

Enjoy the day, whatever you do!


Marianne Stephens
http://www.mariannestephens.net
http://naughtiliterati.com

image:http://www.animationlibrary.com/

What's in a Mother? #RB4U @melissa_keir

What's in a Mother??

Welcome back. It's Melissa Keir, again...Today is the day after Mother's Day but I wanted to take a moment to talk with you about your mom, your grandmother and the wonderful women in your life.

I have been a mother for 25 years, although not a grandmother yet... I'm sure that will come in time- no rush! But I've had almost 50 years as a daughter, dealing with the complex relationships that occur between a mother and a daughter. I'm sure there are many more qualified people reading this, who have their own insights to share...I welcome them. I love learning...it's in part why I'm a teacher.

Mother's have a special place in our hearts. We strive to be like them and often times... unlike them as we learn just who we are. My own relationship with my mother was filled with those conflicts. I remember my mom being my fiercest supporter when I was asked to write 150 times "I will not talk in class". So much so that she often wrote some of the lines herself to take a stand against using writing as a punishment. She ran for School Board Member on the same platform. Looking back, I have to agree. Writing shouldn't ever be a punishment. Too many children hate writing or physically struggle with writing, so why make it worse??


As a teenager, I wanted to be anything but my mom. We looked a lot alike. People remarked on it, how me more than my other sisters looked similar. It came back to haunt me after my mother's death because it was hard for my dad to be close to me. I felt it was how much I resembled her, both in personality and appearance. 

My mom attended my school dances as a chaperone and was so loved by everyone. She danced with all the hot guys and even stood in the "kissing line" for a peck on the cheek. She'd even gone back to school to get her hairdresser's license and cut/styled many of my friends' hair.

It was at this time, I wanted to stand on my own two feet, be my own person. I rebelled. I'm sure she was laughing behind her hands. I took up smoking only to be shown that she had done it many years before. I dressed outrageously, only to be reminded that my mom wore jeans before many women were permitted to.

This was a constant struggle between us, until the day I stood on my own two feet as a wife...then mother. During those years, we were never closer. She's who I called when I needed help baking her special breakfast treat, or help with a colicky baby. She was so proud of my teaching degree and work in the schools.

Too quickly, she left my life. One day we were planning our holiday dinner and the next...a funeral. Now we are back full circle...


My mom wrote a manuscript for a romance novel when I was a teen. She submitted it in large manila envelopes to many publishing houses. Never acceptances but sometimes re-writes or maybe's. While my mom instilled my love of writing and reading- especially romances... she never was able to see any of my work.  I believe that she would have been my biggest supporter and critic as well. She didn't pull punches with me. 

Each Mother's Day is bittersweet. I'm a mother to two wonderful adults now and yet, I still long for more moments with my own mother. Her advice, her acceptance and recognition. I can only hope...I've done her proud.



 http://www.melissakeir.com

See you next month---same bat time...same bat channel! :)

Who's Your Mama? by Rose Anderson

The second Sunday in May is Mother's Day and moms everywhere will go to brunch or receive bouquets and Mother's Day cards. While the holiday is celebrated in the United States and elsewhere, it didn't start out as a hat tip for mom.

In the 1850s when infant mortality was at a high, a West Virginia women's organizer named Ann Reeves Jarvis, held Mothers' Working Days. These social action clubs worked together to fight disease and milk contamination by improving the sanitary conditions in their cities and towns. After the Civil War, Ann Reeves Jarvis saw a need to support every mother's son no matter what side of the Mason-Dixon line they had been on. She organized Mother's Friendship Day for Union and Confederate soldiers.

After Ann Reeves Jarvis' passing in 1908, her daughter Anna organized the first Mother's Day. So impressed by moms and their continual good works, President Woodrow Wilson liked the idea of a day just for mom. In 1914, he officially set aside the second Sunday in May for a national holiday devoted to moms everywhere. It didn't take long before florists, card companies, confectioners, and other merchants cashed in on its popularity.

As wonderful an idea as a national Mother's Day was, Anna Jarvis didn't appreciate marketing on a national scale nor the fact Eleanor Roosevelt (and others) used Mother's Day to raise funds for charities. She actually worked against it by staging boycotts, threatening lawsuits, and deriding the First Lady. She even got herself arrested more than once over it. Seems rather extreme. Perhaps it was because Anna Jarvis had had an unresolved falling out with her own mother. Perhaps she just wanted to acknowledge the ideal mom and not her own. From the start, she only ever wanted a day when you wore a Mother's Day badge to church and thanked the best mom you knew for all she did. No flowers, no card, no candy, and certainly no monies to charities. It's interesting to note the changes to Anna Jarvis' initial idea, and her failed attempt to stop a national holiday, might have actually driven her insane. She died in a Philadelphia sanitarium in 1948 at age 84.

Mama Mia

The American iteration of Mother’s Day has its particular origins as do Mother's Day celebrations around the world. Most celebrate this holiday in the spring. Why? Spring is when all of nature renews. It's mother nature's time of year. From egg laying to birthing, creatures large and small get in on the action. This renewal has always been an important part of our own survival whether on the farm or in our earliest times as hunter gatherers. Honoring mom is a very old tradition.

When I imagine a primordial mother, the first image that comes to mind is the Venus of

Willendorf. She's not one of those slender goddesses in repose in the idyll glades of Ancient Greece, nor is she a sleek-muscled warrior goddess of the old Nordic traditions. Plumped by plenty and filled with fecundity, her wide hips and bountiful breasts declare her fertility and suggest her sustenance. She's the middle aspect of womanhood. No longer maiden, not quite crone. She is the Magna Mater – The Great Mother.

To date, hundreds of similar Mother figures carved of stone and bone and fashioned of clay have been discovered all over the world. Large-breasted or not, most have those wide hips. You can almost imagine the toddler sitting comfortably astride.

Given their great age, it's unfortunate that we can only speculate on their exact purpose. The earliest Mothers are faceless. Such anonymity suggests she was beyond personification. Many wear the scars of motherhood on hips, belly, and breasts in acknowledgement of cycles – the cycles of life and birth – an undeniable symbol of the earth itself.

These Great Mothers, reverently called the Venus figures, span both Paleolithic and Neolithic eras. Some, like the Hohle Fels mammoth-ivory Venus, date back more 30,000 years. Older still are the chevrons –zigzags, M, or V patterns – in 40,000-year-old Neanderthal artworks. These too represent woman and are often depicted beside the wavy lines symbol for water – birth waters.

As a storyteller, I can see that The Great Mother never really left the scene. She became those goddesses worshiped across ancient civilizations. Donning the clothes of each region, she simply modernized. Moms are resourceful like that.

~ More information ~

This youtube video is more than an hour long but entertaining and very informative
https://youtu.be/DKKLOIrQs6Y

Individual figures with descriptions
http://donsmaps.com/venus.html

A terrific poster
http://goddesstimeline.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/MainTimeline.jpg

Two more videos
http://goddesstimeline.com/?page_id=320

Happy Mother's Day to all you moms, aunts, and grandmas, and to all

nurturing souls everywhere. Keep up the good work!

>>۞<<

Rose Anderson is an award-winning author and dilettante who loves great conversation and delights in discovering interesting things to weave into stories. Rose also writes across genres under the pen name Madeline Archer. She lives with her family and small menagerie amid oak groves and prairie in the rolling glacial hills of the upper Midwest.

Stop by my blog for interesting topics all month long.
Find my links page and free reads too! Subscribe to get my posts in your inbox!

http://calliopeswritingtablet.com/

Find Madeline's sweet to spooky stories and Rose's scorching novels in ebook and paperback on Amazon, Barnes&Noble,
and elsewhere.

Rose's Amazon Author Page | Madeline's Amazon Author's Page

Sample my Scorching First Chapters Here

Christmas And Motherhood

My Christmas story, Matrix Crystal Christmas, isn't only about Christmas its about Motherhood.
And since May is the month of Mother's Day, I thought this is a good time to share an excerpt from my book. 

Excerpt:

Maya shook out her boots and peered inside for arachnids. They were custom-made Zeeman riding boots since her old Earth boots had long since worn out. As soon as she pulled them on, Vach settled in front of her and reached for the laces. “You’re my husband, not my servant.”

“This is how our relationship started.” He deftly tied one and moved to the other.

She blinked at him. “You’re wooing me again?”

“It seems the right thing to do.” He stood and held out his hands.

She allowed him to pull her to her feet. “You don’t have to. You already have me.”

“I’ll do whatever I feel is necessary so you’ll love me again, even start over.” He kissed her hand. “Greetings, my name is Vach Namaste of the Namaste Clan. Allow me to be your guide through this inhospitable desert land and woo you as a clan lord should.” He hugged her. “And tonight, I’ll make love to you as if it’s our first time.”

His hot breath in her ear vibrated down her body and settled into the apex of her legs. She drew in a ragged breath. They hadn’t made love in months. “You make it hard to say no.”

“Good.” He drew back and smiled at her. “I want you to think about tonight, on how

I will worship every part of your body.”

Something low swelled and begged for attention. “I thought you wanted to stop trying.”

“We’re not trying for a baby. I just want to make love to my beautiful wife.” He grabbed up the rolled sleeping bags and walked out of the tent.

She let out a shaky breath. Baby-making sex was different from regular sex. It seemed like forever since they’d made love just because they wanted to enjoy each other’s bodies.

Kindle

Smashwords

Nook

Mother, May I Write Erotic Romance Books?

Okay...so I'm wondering how many erotic romance authors discussed this with their mothers before actually writing their stories.

I know I didn't! My mother, as a reader of sweet romances and biographies, wasn't the person I needed to ask what her opinion would be. I know she wouldn't have been happy, but she would support me.

And, she did. She just didn't want to READ my erotic romance books...which was okay with me. She read my other books, and had me send some to relatives. One aunt wanted an erotic romance book, and she had me send her one of those. But, like I said, my mother didn't want to read them.

Now that she's in a nursing home with dementia, she hardly reads anything. I don't discuss what I'm writing since her "world" revolves around things she finds important at any given minute. And, her memory isn't good so talking about my books is something I'd have to repeat many times.

I know she supported me and still would, in anything I did or do. That's special for me.

At age 91, I'm just grateful she was able to celebrate another Mother's Day. My questions now are based on her needs and wants. She's given me a lifetime of advice, counseling, and support. I'm very blessed!

The Naughty Literati have a new anthology releasing on 15 May: Naughty Flings.
Twelve Naughty Little Romps including BBW, Contemporary, FemDomme, M/M, Mythological, Paranormal, Regency, Shape-shifter & Vampire from some Amazon bestselling authors!

 Buying Adam ~ Marianne Stephens
Under false pretenses, Jessica wins Adam at a Charity Bachelor auction. Secret desires for each other ignite into passionate lovemaking. Will the truth divide them?

Visit http://naughtyliterati.com for more information including buy links, others anthologies, blurbs, and excerpts.

photo:Flickr:Jonathan Rolande's photostream

Kitchen Counter Wisdom

The best memories I have of my mother were of our morning tea drinking sessions during my teen years. We sat on bar stools at the kitchen counter, each drinking two or three cups of hot milky tea. Those were the best conversations we ever had, and I recall them to this day.

There was no telling where our conversations would go, but invariably she wove some real life wisdom into the theme of the day by the time we finished drinking cup number two.

Ours was a complex relationship. As a child I couldn’t understand her, and was always trying to avoid her sudden outbursts. These days, I understand her better. Her role in my life was largely as a negative role model, meaning she taught me more about how I did not want to be than how I did want to be. I’m very thankful to her for that.  

Colombian emeralds were my mother’s favorite gem stone. My father gifted her several stunning sparklers over the years. Emeralds are said to aid in faithfulness and forecasting, and she was both a very faithful wife, and a gifted psychic. She often forecast the future from across the kitchen counter, and her perceptions were usually accurate. Unfortunately, she was afraid of her psychic abilities and shut them down in the end.

She always took great pride in her garden, especially her tropical flowers. Geraniums, hibiscus, bougainvillea, birds of paradise and lilies of the valley were her favorites. Spending time with her flowers brought her more happiness than almost anything else.

A quirky fact about her is that she had a wild pet lizard named Lizzie. He lived under our outdoor refrigerator on the patio. Every morning around 11am he came out and awaited her. She gave him bread and he gobbled it up. He was the biggest lizard ever. There was a great bond between my mother and the lizard, and this continued for years.

Mother, May I…..? Questions I Should Have Asked My Mother

She was a very tense and intense woman, and believed children should be seen and not heard. My brother and I were never allowed to ask questions while growing up.

She’s been gone for nearly thirty years already. She had breast cancer in her mid-forties, and was told to stop smoking if she wanted to improve her chances of survival. Defiant to the end, she told the doctor she’d rather die with a cigarette in her hand. A decade later she died of lung cancer.

There are many questions I’d love to ask her. Some are too private, but here are a few.

Why Did You Never Let Me Learn To Cook?

Why Did You Keep Smoking After Breast Cancer?

Why Didn’t You Open The Antique Shop You Always Wanted?

Why Did You Send Us Away To Boarding School When You Were So Lonely?

I wouldn’t trade my mother for anything. So now, I raise a toast with a hot cup of milky tea and say~To Mary~I love you.

GEMMA JULIANA is a multi-published author who lives in an enchanted cottage in Texas with her handsome hero, teen son and a comical dog. She loves making new friends and hearing from readers. Exotic coffee and chocolate fuel her creativity. You can buy Gemma’s books on Amazon.  

Visit Gemma’s website: http://www.gemmajuliana.com

Follow @Gemma_Juliana on Twitter: https://twitter.com/gemma_juliana

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