Ode to My Little Mama: Video of Little Mamas, Here and There.

Sobbing and moaning as though someone had died, my 87-year-old, Little Mama  was frantically searching her purse for tissue. Thankfully, I had a stack of napkins resting in the pocket of the driver’s door of my SUV.  I bought the red, surf mobile, Ford Escape for two reasons:  I go surfing whenever I can and my octogenarian parents can easily maneuver in and out of the vehicle.  I transport them to their respective doctor appointments, to beauty appointments (my dad loves getting out for his monthly pedicures).  Our adventures in grocery shopping include occasional trips to Costco – second only to Disneyland -- in that the staff at each (especially in Temecula) sees to it that my parents have an electric shopping cart for their pleasure.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do. My life is over!” she cried, exasperated, while pushing back the thin, white, curly strands of hair flying around her face like soft, electrified angora.

“Little Mama,” I said, choosing my words carefully. “You can always take the DMV test again in a couple of months.”  She immediately stopped wailing.

“I can?” she asked, sniffling, wiping the tears from her cheeks.

“Yeah. We can come back. No problem. Why are you so upset?”

“You wouldn’t understand,” she answered, her voice quivering and cracking.

Really, I do understand.  My Little Mama is used to being in the driver’s seat of life.  Similarly, the driver’s seat in her well-maintained, older Buick remains in a position to accommodate her diminutive stature. The vehicle is always backed into the garage, ready for take-off.  Little Mama has been known to take mini-road trips on a whim. This is not to mention that she frequently pops in to visit with her friends and her family residing close by.

Little Mama loves cruising the roads so fast and so furiously, she comes home with occasional speeding tickets, boasting about nearly losing the ‘fuzz’ in hot pursuit behind her, if not for the slow, old, foolish driver obstructing her imaginary escape. To her, driving equals freedom. Freedom! I get it. I relish it. I would die without this freedom, too.

Earlier in the morning, Little Mama met me in the kitchen, wearing her favorite beige sweater, draped over a lavender-colored blouse. She wears black gaucho pants whenever she goes out in public; the wide pant legs hide the necessary catheter gear strapped to her left leg.

Little Mama insists that the bag has to be positioned just right using old, garter belts and elastic shoe laces as fasteners. She’s fearful that the long tube will become disconnected from the durable, plastic bag, which will surely spring a leak at any time. The gadgetry is never secured well enough to her limb. She dons the larger set because her legs fill with water and swell like balloons, ready to burst.

Before any journey, we ritualistically fiddle with and bicker about the damned catheter bag until we’re ready to head out of the door. Despite my professional background as a registered nurse, both of us end up in tears of frustration.

“Little Mama, we don’t need to padlock the bag,” I said, kneeling down beside her in a futile effort to hide it.

“I know, I know! Let me do it,” she ordered, shooing my hands out of the way. “I made this strap to go on near my ankle.  This string goes over the tubing and through that little eyelet down there. Do you see the eyelet? It’s right there,” she pointed, placing her index finger right on the spot.

“Little Mama, we need to go. Let’s just go! No one cares about the bag,” I said, impatiently.

“I care! I hate this!," she yelled, crying alligator tears. And so it goes.

Of late, her garments hang loosely on her petite, bony frame as she slowly walks hunched over a maroon-colored walker, complete with four wheels, a seat and a wire basket attached to the front: The Hummer of walkers.  She trades her miniature, urban assault vehicle for a sturdy, wooden cane resting against the wall in an alcove adjacent to the garage.

While helping her to balance from behind as she carefully stepped over the threshold, I couldn't believe that Little Mama had actually pored over the manual for the DMV driver’s test. Who reads that stuff, anyway?

In her studious preparation, there were days when I’d find both Little Mama and the open test booklet nestled in her blue, reclining, rocking chair. There’s no way she’s going to pass the exam, but I don't have the heart to tell her.  So, I went through the motions of taking her to the Temecula DMV office. I was thinking the trip would do us good.

Just where the 215 and the 15 freeways meet, Little Mama looks up and enthusiastically declares how things have changed in Hemet.

“Hemet? We’re going to the Temecula DMV,” I said, emphatically.

“I don’t want to go to Temecula. I have to go to Hemet! Take me back home if we’re not going to Hemet,” she commanded.

Frenzied, I explained that the Temecula office is optimally located for the other things I had to get done. My life is calendar-centric. Time slots are allocated for my career endeavors, for my 13-year-old son, Juan’s, activities, for my parents, ad infinitum. If it’s not penciled in my calendar, it won’t get done.

“I have to go to Hemet. They’re expecting me! Take me home! I don’t want to interfere with your day,” she vented and I conceded.

“Alrighty, then,” I mumbled in a huff. Bated breath, Little Mama waved a white napkin in the air, signaling reluctant surrender. We took the next exit heading for the DMV in Hemet. I began making phone calls, rescheduling appointments. More tears of my frustration, though streaming behind my sunglasses this time.

I’m not sure when our respective lifestyles evolved into what each is today. Maybe it was after Little Mama became really sick in 2005. Then my dad became gravely ill around the holidays in 2006.Then Little Mama. Then my dad. Then my Little Mama. Then my dad.

I've reluctantly placed my career on the back burner as I stare at all of my hard-earned credentials and awards latently adorning my Wall of Fame. I was driving in BIG circles from my home in Murrieta, to Wildomar, dropping my son off at Cornerstone Christian School, driving back around to Menifee, tending to my homebound parent, then driving to Kaiser in Riverside, or to the rehab facility, back to Wildomar, retrieving my son long enough to drop him off at his sports activities while I shopped for groceries or worked out.  Phew. Take a breath. Then I pick up Juan, drive back to my parents’ house to put the grocery items away and finish a load of laundry for them.

By nine o’clock at night, I'd gratefully arrive home.  Then I set to task helping my son with his homework, bless his heart. Sometimes I hid in the bathroom so he wouldn't hear me cry for a spell. Where had my strength gone? What was my life coming to that I felt everything was spiraling out of control? Crash. Then burn. I fizzled out.

Legal issues have surfaced with regard to living wills and durable power-of-attorney for health care. Tools were needed so that my parents could safely and easily conduct their activities of daily living. For example: persuading my dad to use a walker took awhile; he's fallen a few times. I had lovingly explained that a walker helps to stabilize his wobbly gait. Another fall could result in an immobilizing fracture. Immobility for the elderly spells predictable, devastating health issues.

“Dad, I’m an RN, remember? I know these things. I need your help,” I pleaded, pulling out a brand new, titanium walker from his closet.

“The only thing missing is an engine,” he said, laughing. He finally complied.

As I’m writing, what started out to be sort of a tribute to my Little Mama, it occurs to me that this piece isn’t enough of an ode to HER. Little Mama would give any one of you the shirt off of her back; she would comfort and cradle you in her arms to ease your pain; she would drive a thousand miles to rescue you from so much as a flat tire – and she would help you change it. She always answers the phone.

Little Mama was raised in a Catholic orphanage, but she knew her parents, briefly, before they died. As a young woman, she uneventfully hitchhiked from Duluth, Minnesota to Los Angeles, California, with a friend named Muriel.  Finding a job as a riveter, she married, she had four children and then she divorced after ten years, (circa 1940-1950).

Little Mama – Marian – married my dad, John, and has remained so for more than 55 years.  I’m 52 years old, while my sister, Michelle, is 50. I recall Little Mama working as a punch-press operator when I was in elementary school. She would drop us off at daycare around six in the morning.  Like clockwork, she picked us up at four-thirty in the afternoon, Monday through Friday, until we began attending junior high school.

When she was 65 years old, Little Mama retired. I know she mourned the loss of her occupational and professional identity to a business which folded. She was our family’s breadwinner for many, many years.  My dad suffered a debilitating stroke when I was 12 years old. This is a whole, different testament and era demonstrating Little Mama’s love and resolve. I know she drove her car in BIG circles, too, for a long, long while. She did so without much help and without complaint. Looking back, I don’t know how she managed to work, full-time, while taking care of my recuperating dad, along with me and my younger sister.  

Was there ever a temptation luring her to keep on driving past such an arduous experience?

Little Mama is a creative genius. She can sew a garment together without a pattern and have it finished by the wee hours in the morning. She can concoct a gourmet meal from leftovers and repair household items like a master. Her Elna sewing machine, as well, her Black and Decker drill motor, each with all of the implements, are still operable.

There are untold stories demonstrating Little Mama’s indomitable spirit, of her immeasurable loyalty and of her unshakable faith in God, based on the love for her family.  Her family – me, my dad and all of my siblings – is the reason for her existence and her determination.  She told me so, and no! She has never entertained the idea to keep driving past any enormous, temporary trial – and she’s encountered a few.   Keep moving forward? Perhaps.  Keep on praying? Always.  Keep a mental picture of her loved ones placed in the forefront near her heart, every second of the day? Absolutely.

Her work ethic and economic recourse resonates so profoundly in my life, I must work. I contemplate many blossoming, entrepreneurial visions which the Lord has placed on my heart and how those visions will make manifest. I do love working and I love my family more. Neither is mutually exclusive.  Hands to work; hearts to God.

Did I share with you that Little Mama speaks directly to God and He to her? She had just come home from the hospital and I was staying with my parents, overnight. I was gently awakened in the wee hours by soft voices speaking and laughing, as close friends would over a cup of coffee.  However, the phone didn’t ring; no one entered through the front door; I could hear my dad snoring as he slept in his room. I just couldn’t figure out to whom she was speaking until I was enveloped in such a profound love and welcomed peace, I fell back to sleep covered in a warm blanket of God’s mercy.

I would never have figured that my Little Mama would have passed the DMV written test, either, but pass she did. She hasn’t driven anywhere in a long time, but she still dreams of doing so. If the truth be known, I’m happy that she has her driver’s license, along with the symbolic meaning denoted on the card: Marian Gloria Giusti,  her unique identity, her age-old wisdom as evidenced by her birth date and the photo emanating her timeless, inner beauty. Yes, the license is a hard copy of her determination and of course, her manifest freedom, especially when she’s at the helm of an electric cart driving about the aisles of Costco. She says the shopping cart traffic jams get worse every year.

I’m my mother’s daughter, though I’m half the woman of godliness and grace that she is. Her tenacity is something I still wish to acquire, but it’s her laser-like, intuitive accuracy in assessing people, places and things that I’ve inherited – a worthy tool.  Little Mama is nowhere near as diplomatic as I, but she’ll never leave you to guess what she observes –so don’t ask, unless you really, really want to know the answer.  She’s always correct.  I love my Little Mama, more than I can say, but I desire to show her more.  I can well attest that no one has ever died from an overdose of genuine love and caring.

My joy, my grief, my hope, my love, did all within this BIG circle move, or drive as the case may be. To the Little Mamas everywhere: May you bask in the love and caring of your family at every turn, notwithstanding driving in circles.

This was written for Mothers Day, 2010. Little Mama passed away on June 8, 2010. My Little Mama asked to be scattered at sea, near the pier in Oceanside, so she can remain unencumbered in her travels. I pop in to visit her every time I paddle out. Thanks to the moms, here and there, for allowing me to take photos of your beauty and your children.