My Most Unforgettable Character

Mama’s face was radiant with pride. I knew that everything we had achieved or would achieve was because of my parents. When we were young children, my mother was, especially, our mentor. Not until I became an adult did I realize how special she was.

Delight in Devotion. My mother was born in a small town in northern Italy. She was three when her parents immigrated to this country in 1926. They lived on Chicago’s South Side, where my grandfather worked making ice cream.

Mama thrived in the hectic urban environment. At 16, she graduated first in her high-school class, went on to secretarial school, and finally worked as an executive secretary for a railroad company.

She was beautiful, too. When a local photographer used her pictures in his monthly window display, she was flattered. Her favorite portrait showed her sitting by Lake Michigan, her hair windblown, her gaze reaching toward the horizon. My mother always used to say that when you died, God gave you back your “best self”. She’d show us that picture and say, “This is what I’m going to look like in heaven.”

My parents were married in 1944. Dad was a quiet and intelligent man who was 17 when he left Italy. Soon after,a hit-and-run accident left him with a permanent limp.Dad worked hard selling candy to Chicago office workers on their break. He had little formal schooling. His English was self-taught. Yet he eventually built a small, successful wholesale candy business. Dad was generous, handsome and deeply religious. Mama was devoted to him.

After she married, my mother quit her job and gave herself to her family. In 1950, with three children, Dad moved the family to a farm 40 miles from Chicago. He worked the land and commuted to the city to run his business. Mama said good-bye to her parents and friends and traded her busy city neighborhood for a more isolated life. But she never complained. By 1958, our modest white farmhouse was filled with six children, and Mama was delighted.

Think Big. My mother never studied books on parenting.Yet she knew how to raise children. She heightened our self-esteem and helped us reach our potential.

One fall day, I sat at the kitchen table while Mama peeled potatoes. She spied Dad out the window on his tractor and smiled. “Your father has accomplished so much,”she said proudly. “He really is somebody.”

My mother wanted each of us to be somebody, too.“Your challenge is to be everything you can. Mine is to help,” she always said.

She read to us every day and used home-made flash cards to teach us phonics. She bolstered our confidence,praising even our most ordinary accomplishments. When I was ten, I painted a stack of wooden crates white and nailed them together to make a wobbly bookcase. “It’s wonderful!” Mama exclaimed. “Just what we need.”She used it for many years.

In the dining room are two paint-by-number pictures that my sister Gloria and brother Leo did as kids. Several years ago, Leo commented that the pictures weren’t very good and offered to take them down. But Mama wouldn’t hear of it. “They are there to remind you how much you could accomplish even as children,” she said.

Her confidence in us was infectious. When my sister Carla was 12, she announced she was going to be a lawyer.“You can do that,” Mama said. “You can do anything if you put your mind to it.”

Tour Guide. To Mama, education was a key part of her blueprint for success. Four of us went to a nearby, one-room schoolhouse. My mother made up for its shortcomings by getting us educational toys, talking to us about history, politics and current events, and helping with homework. The best part of getting a good report card was her unstinting praise.

When I was in the third grade, she urged our teacher to organize a field trip to Chicago museums. My mother helped the teacher rent a bus and plan the trip. She even served as tour guide, pointing out landmarks and recounting local history.

When it came time to think about college, there was never a question that we’d all go. Inspired by our parents’ sacrifice, we studied hard to earn scholarships,and applied for grants and financial aid. We also took jobs to earn money for school. Working in a grocery store, I learned the value of a dollar. “Work is a blessing,”Mama always reminded us.

She never asked for anything for herself. “You don’t have to buy me a birthday present,” she said one time.“Instead write me a letter about yourself. Tell me about your life. Is anything worrying you? Are you happy?”