My Mother’s Words

Many years ago, forty six to be exact, my life changed in every possible way. The year was 1977 and I was just a teenager when my mother spoke the words that would influence the most important decision I’ve ever made.

Mom and Dad divorced when I was a young boy, not yet a teenager, leaving my mother to raise three children on her own. I didn’t understand then but I do now, how difficult a time that must have been for her. Here was a young woman who now had to fill the dual role of mother and father to three growing kids, two of which were rambunctious boys. I’m sure there were many sleepless, tear filled nights, during that time.

But she somehow got through it and dragged us, kicking and screaming, into adulthood.

She spoke many words of advice to me over those early years, which I mostly ignored, but the advice she gave me on one day in June 1977 has stayed with me all the days of my life.

The words she spoke that day would change the trajectory of my life and lead me down a path filled with wonderful memories and no regrets.

This is the story of that day and what her words have meant to me.

Thanks mom.

1977

June 1977 was a great time to be a teenager. I didn’t know it at the time but that year hearkened great change for the world as we knew it and, more importantly, for me personally.

I’d just arrived at the magic age of eighteen, while my girlfriend was still a few months shy of her sixteenth. We were doing what all teenagers were doing at that time; enjoying youth to the fullest.

We spent our days with large groups of friends, listening to some of the greatest popular music to ever be created. It was truly an incredible year for music and music lovers.

Hotel California, by The Eagles, Dreams by Fleetwood Mac and Somebody to love by Queen are just a few of the gifts that were given to us that year.

For those of us that love to read it was also a great year for books as The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien and Roots by Alex Haley were at the top of the best seller lists.

It was also a great time to be a movie lover as some of the defining movies of our time were in theaters. To name just a few, Star wars, Rocky and King Kong were all released that year.

1977 wasn’t just about entertainment; there were also great advancements happening in science and technology. Such as the inventions of the Artificial Heart, the MRI machine, the Personal Stereo and the Neutron Bomb.

I believe that Apple Computers , Apple II, the first personal computer with color graphics, going on sale on June 10, 1977 changed the world as we knew it. A direct line can be traced from that time to the smart phones of today and what we have become as a society.

What a teenager of today sees, as technology required to lead a normal and productive life, would be far fetched science fiction for a teenager in 1977.

One June day of that year, around the time that Apple started to take over the world, I had the wind knocked out of me and my life changed forever.

It was a beautiful summer afternoon and I and several of my friends were playing football in a local field. We were all young and strong and didn’t believe in non-contact sport, so this wasn’t touch or flag football. It was no pads, full on tackle, no holds barred, knock the shit out of you football and we all loved it.

I believe the girls, sitting together on the grassy hill, loved it just as much as us boys. They seemed to take great joy in watching us beat the crap out of each other on the field before acting like a flock of nurses at the end. They would apply Band-Aids on cuts or ice on a black eye or tape some strained fingers together, while giggling and laughing at our pain.

Normally I would get the wind knocked out of me a couple of times during a game, but that day I was untouchable. I’d been tackled a few times but came out of it basically unscathed; with just a few nicks and bruises and a sore knee.

I couldn’t say the same for my best buddy, Keith, who seemed to be in a lot of pain and holding his right wrist which looked broken. A few of us escorted him to the parking area where we helped him into a friend’s car, which would take him to the hospital.

When I got back to the field a few of the guys were playing a game of touch football with some of the girls and the area was filled with laughter. This was always the best part of the day as the boys followed the rules and played touch but the girls made up their own rules and played full on tackle on the boys.

I sat on the grassy hill laughing as I watched several of the girls chasing the new kid, Barry, around the field trying to be the lucky one to tackle him. He was blond haired and tanned and was visiting for the summer with his family, from California. More importantly to all the girls was the fact that he was single.

Just as a couple of the girls finally caught him and were rolling around in the grass laughing, I saw my girlfriend and sister approaching from the far end of the field. They were returning from my girlfriends doctor appointment and were both smiling as they approached. She’d told me the day before that she would be late for the game and that the appointment was just routine, so I wasn’t concerned.

When they got close I could see them talk for a minute before my sister joined in the fun on the field and my girlfriend came and sat with me on the hill.

After a welcome kiss and some small talk, she just sat beside me and stared out at the field, not speaking. After a few minutes I started to feel a little concerned as she hadn’t said anything about her visit with the doctor. Finally I took her hand in mine and asked, “Is everything ok? You seem very quite.”

She thought for a few seconds before turning to me and smiling, “I don’t know. I’m scared.”

Now I was scared and asked, “Why? What’s wrong?”

Her next words knocked the wind out of me and changed my life forever.

She looked at me and started to cry as she said, “Jerry, I’m pregnant.”

The next few days are all a blur to me now. I can’t remember anything clearly from those days including conversations with family and friends. The only things that are clear to me are the emotions we were both going through. The strongest memories are tied to emotions and what I remember feeling the most is fear.

There was no feeling of joy or gratitude as our days were filled with fear and confusion. As we were still really just kids with no real life experience, we had no idea what we were doing or what the next steps or our choices were. It all felt unreal, like a dream.

Advice was coming at us from every side and every family member. They were all throwing around the big words like Abortion, Adoption and Responsibility.

We spent some time with just us trying to decide what to do and discovered that we both wanted to do the right thing and keep the baby. But even at our young age we knew that wanting to do something and actually being able to do something are two completely different things.

We knew that keeping the baby would change our lives forever, and that was scary, but what scared us even more was what the consequences could be if we screwed up somehow. What if something happened to the baby because of a poor decision on our part? Who were we to think we could raise a child on our own, when as teenagers we counted on our parents to take care of our basic needs?

These questions and hundreds of others filled us with doubt in our ability to be good parents, the kind of parents that this child deserved.

I believe the day that changed my feelings of doubt and fear to feelings of belief in myself and determination to do the right thing was the day we sat down and had an open conversation with my mother.

We talked about how afraid we were and how we couldn’t decide the right path to take as everybody was telling us what they wanted us to do and what would be the best thing for the baby.

I remember my mother just listened for awhile without speaking so I asked her what she wanted us to do.

That’s when she said the words that changed everything.

She said, “Don’t ask me what I want and don’t worry about what everybody else wants. What you want is what is important here.”

She stared at us for a few seconds before saying, “So, what do you guys want?”

My girlfriend and I said the same thing, “We want to keep the baby, but we know nothing about taking care of a child.”

That’s when Mom laughed and said, “Nobody knows anything about caring for a baby until they have one. In the beginning the baby teaches you not the other way around and every baby is different so every parents experience is different. I know your worried about making mistakes but don’t worry about that because I’ll tell you now, you will make them. Everybody does.”

I could tell that my girlfriend was coming to a decision as my mother spoke and I knew in my heart that this was really her decision to make. I had told her several times that I would support whatever she wanted to do, thinking this was what she needed from me.

But thinking about my mother’s words, “So, what do you guys want,” I realized that what she really needed was for me to commit and be a part of this decision that would change her life.

I looked in her eyes before looking at my mother and saying, “We want to do this mom but so many people are telling us were too young and that they don’t believe we are ready or capable of raising a child.”

That’s when she gave me the best advice she could have.

Mom had raised me and my younger brother and sister, mostly on her own and knew what it felt like to be judged and doubted by people that thought they had her best interest at heart.

She raised her voice a little and said, “Don’t ever let other people weaken your belief in yourself. You can take advice from friends and family but ultimately the consequences’ of your actions fall solely on you, not them. If you believe in yourself even when others don’t, most times, you will make the choices that are best for you. Both of you are good kids and have one important thing in common; you both want what’s best for this baby. That’s love and the number one thing this child will need is love. Everything else will come naturally.”

We made the choice to keep the baby after that day and not to long after I moved to Toronto to work and live with her older brother and his family.

I flew to Toronto on my own as my girlfriend decided to stay in Newfoundland with her mother for a few months.

It was a difficult time for me as I knew her brother would like nothing more than to rip my arm off and beat me to death with it but I did what I needed to do, I flew to Toronto and moved in with a man that wanted to kill me.

He didn’t kill me and after a few months my girlfriend joined me in Toronto. I picked her up at the airport and I still remember to this day, thinking that she looked like she was carrying a watermelon in her belly, which is not how she looked when I left and it scared the shit out of me.

A couple of months later, in February 1978 our daughter was born and I fell in love.

It’s almost impossible to explain but the first moment that I held that child in my arms, she spoke to me somehow and said that everything would be okay.

I haven't looked back since that moment. I truly believe that the first time I held my daughter in my arms was the defining moment of my life. Everything changed and I became what I needed to be, a father.

It’s forty-five years later now and I wouldn’t change anything.

I don’t know where my life would have taken me if we had made a different choice. Maybe I would have been a great artist or the prime minister of Canada or discovered the cure for cancer. All of these things could have been great impacts and contributions to our world.

Every man wants to do something, or should want to do something, that has a lasting impact and leaves their imprint on this world.

I know without a doubt that our decision way back in 1977 has done that.

If we had chosen a different route maybe my daughter would not have been born and the world would be a less loving place because of that decision.

She is the strongest and most driven person I know and I truly believe that she makes a positive impact on anyone that meets her.

She has been the gift and light of my life and I wouldn’t change anything that happened, no matter how difficult, for all the money in the world.

So, in closing I just want to say this; never let other people make your important choices; believe in yourself even when no one else does. But most of all if the right choice needs to be made always say, “I can do this.”

And to my Mother, thank you for never giving up and teaching me to be a man. But most of all thank you for the advice that helped me make the decision that has defined my life. Because of your words I have had the great pleasure of celebrating forty-five Father’s days.

Mom,the pictures below show ,in no small way, what you have done.