Birthday follows Mother's Day

This year there was a full week between Mother's Day and my mom's birthday.  She told me last month that "we always" celebrate the two events at once.  But she's 96 years old now.  She has spent too many of those years sublimating her own desires for convenience of other people.  My brother and sister-in-law and their busy schedules.  My living half an ocean away.  My father's indifference.  All those years of boarding school as she was growing up, never learning the joy of honoring each special, small event in one's life.

She was clearly thrilled when my brother suggested lunch at the Honolulu Academy of Arts.  I usually use the handicap parking on the other side of the building.  My brother has a better sense of logistics.  In his choice of parking lot, it was out of the car, wait for the guard to unlock the gate, down 4 stairs, and voila! We were in the Pavilion Cafe.  Check out Ian's video of her day and his text version of the event.  Note the birthday card.  It's from a company here in Hawaii that does cards for local consumption.  I've learned the trick.  If it originates in Hawaii, she will probably like it.

The event that Mother was referring to at the beginning of the video, the thing that happened about 1928 or 1929, was a weaving demonstration that she gave while still in high school.  We're not talking baskets or mats here, although both can be done very artistically and can require great skill.  We're talking fabric, threads-on-a-loom weaving.  She was demonstrating, and thinks the demonstration was given at the Academy.  I remember hearing about this demonstration years ago.  I don't remember hearing where it was given.  I also remember hearing that the bedroom in this house that became mine when I was born, and is once again mine, originally held her loom.

I give thanks for my mom and her 96 years of productive life.  I give thanks that she is alert and still able to do  many of the things she loves.

Don't forget to pray ....