This post was written in early February 2007.

My 86-year-old mom, now recovering from surgery to repair a broken hip sustained in a recent fall, oscillates between senility and lucidity. Communicating with her has become very difficult, and we are often exasperated by her irrational behavior. The fact that neither my two sisters nor I was ever very close to her does not help the situation. As adults, we’ve tended to keep our distance because she often stated that she had not wanted children and certainly did not want the ones she got, which would be . . . us. Nevertheless, I believe that our mom did try to provide us with normal childhoods. For the record, this is what I remember.

She sent us to Japanese Language School so that we would have a greater understanding of our East Asian heritage. She was a Girl Scout troop leader, and all of us participated in these scouting programs from Brownies through Cadettes. Mom produced the weekly bulletin for our church; we went to Sunday School, sang in the church choir, and attended Pilgrim Fellowship. We went to church suppers and other such events. We belonged to the Kekaha Community Association: in the summer, we swam in the pool almost daily, and throughout the year enjoyed the carnivals, rodeos, and various holiday celebrations. Starting in the first grade, we all took piano lessons. In the summers, we studied ukulele and hula; we went horseback riding. There was swim team, band practice.

As far back as I can remember, she was a “Working Mom”: she was a vocational education teacher at the local high school and beloved by her many students. She taught typing, shorthand, bookkeeping, office practice, and general business and trained generations of office workers on our island. Whether she was a natural-born teacher or not, I don’t know, but she taught us children how to type and also how to drive, surely two of the most useful skills for life in late 20th century America.

Mom took us bowling on Saturday mornings. She taught us badminton and croquet, which we often played as a family after supper. Like all the wives and mothers in the 50s, she ran the household — shopping and cooking and cleaning and taking care of our numerous pets — the cats, parakeets, fish, turtles, rabbits, chickens, and even the stray dog or two. She planned our birthday parties and showered us with gifts on Christmas, and there was always a treat even for the more obscure holidays like Girls’ Day.

Mom was also a knitter and embroiderer. Even now, when I happen to glance into my linen closet, I’m amazed at what she did: she started hope chests for us when we were in elementary school. We all have handmade mittens, socks, scarves, and sweaters; we have intricately embroidered tablecloths and napkins. How she found the time for this I really don’t know.

Mom was an indefatigable correspondent. To her father in Connecticut and to high school and college friends, she wrote pages and pages of single-spaced, typewritten prose on a weekly basis. Had we grown up with the Internet, Mom would have been among the first to be enthralled with the promise of this new epistolary mode.

Sometimes it seemed that Mom subscribed to every general interest periodical ever published, among them the Christian Science Monitor, Time, New Yorker, Holiday, Sunset, and National Geographic. And though she might have been months behind, she read them all.

Mom wanted us to experience the wider world beyond the horizon of our little island. For example, she masterminded our cross-country trip in 1964, which even now is the one opportunity I have had to see some of our country’s unique and most magnificent sights. She took us to the other Hawaiian islands; she sent us to Europe and the Orient.

I don’t know if she did all this because she wanted to or felt that she had to, but the fact remains, she did it. She was bad at parenting, but I give her credit for trying. In spite of her, I believe that I had a happy childhood.

Note: Photograph courtesy of Austin’s Uptown Studio, Sacramento CA, All rights reserved