My Mom's Summer Vacation in Wisconsin

My mom sitting on the sofa in my new Wisconsin apartment.

In the summer of 2007 let the records show that for the first time in many years my mom left her comfortable home in Indiana and spent an extended period of time somewhere else. She left the state, slept in a completely different bed, saw new people and places, and enjoyed it all. My Mom came to Wisconsin this summer.

My mom is 83 this year and she still gets around quite well. She's been through many medical esisodes during her life including two C-Section kids, a number of surgeries, a trip to the Mayo Clinic in the 70's for diagnosis and treatment of something the doctors in Indiana couldn't find, two knee replacements, and most recently cataract surgery that led to a serious eye infection and temporary blindness in one eye. But she's back and nothing will keep her down.

My mom grew up on a farm in Indiana during the Great Depression. She was one of 13 children and had brothers and sisters old enough to not only parent her as a child, but to produce their own offspring so that she has nieces and nephews that are almost the same age as she. It was not an easy life and she did not get along well with her father resulting in a decision to leave home at age 16. She grew up fast in the 1940s and married a young man who was called into military service and fought in Europe only to be killed in action. Married only a short time my mother was soon a widow.

A young woman, my mom has most of her life ahead of her when this photo was taken.

She moved on and went to beauty school where she graduated at the top of her class. It was there that she met a woman who was the sister of a fellow she would one day meet. He became my father.

In the 1950s she became a wife and mother to two boys with a husband who wanted to operate a business for himself and soon opened a grocery store in a small Indiana town called Osceola. Having long ago given up the practice of hair styling, she pitched in with Dad and opened the store and helped two little boys grow up and get into school. Within a few years the business prospered to a point where my parents built a new store with the house attached as was relatively common in the days before Jewel, Dominick's, Pick N Save, and other large chains. As a kid growing up I had both my parents there but it was my mom who had milk and cookies for two hungry boys when they got off the bus in the afternoon and could always be counted on for a hot breakfast on cold Indiana winter mornings.

She worked hard in the store, kept house, and still managed to have time for a family. My mom was the mom who picked up kids from practice after school or went to the ballgames or band concerts so that my dad could run the store.

When I went off to college my parents didn't have money to cover costs but my mom would slip a $20 into an occasion letter so that her son could have a few treats and a little spending money. When that boy became a grown up (using that term a bit loosely here) she became Grandma Kay to Sierra and Jourdan and gave a lot of time to help watch the kids after the store closed in the 1980s. In retirment, my mom continued to work in various jobs including a retail/catalogue store, a sewing factory, and convenience market.

Me, Jourdan, and my mom at Jourdan's graduation party in 2005.

When my dad passed away in the late 1990s she stayed in the house and remains there today. Knee and eye problems slowed her down a little but not much.

When I moved to Illinois in 2003 I kept in contact with my mom with regular phone calls but only infrequent visits. One Christmas she came to Crystal Lake with Jourdan and we had a nice visit. My move to Wisconsin this spring seemed like a big mountain to climb but when we both realized she could spend time here and not have to stay in Indiana we started planning her summer vacation.

My mom spent almost six weeks here. I had to spend a lot of time at work but in the free hours in the evenings and week ends we tried to explore Wausau and the surrounding area. We ate dinner in a lot of places, shopped in the stores, and toured the community. She stayed until the last day of June when I drove her back to Indiana. A little sadly too I think for both of us.

It was a good time. It was the first time I'd actually lived under the same roof as my mom in almost thirty years. We ate more meals together that we have in years. And watched a lot of TV too, especially old episodes of I Love Lucy and a fair amount of Lifetime. When she got bored she folded my underwear, cooked dinner, ran the vacuum and became good buddies with Nigel the cat, something I really never expected. She took lots of naps and I hope had a good time. She liked it here in Wisconsin and every time we crested the hill on Volkman Street in sight of Rib Mountain she'd say, "there's OUR mountain!"

I learned a lot about my mom this summer and about myself. This visit reconnected me with a lot of family stories I'd forgotten and probably will forget again. It was also a reminder of how much she cherished my dad. She speaks of him in a friendly sort of awe or reverence though sometimes as I kid all I could recall was the times when they, like most married couples, had disagreements and differences of opinion.

My mom at Jourdan's apartment in Milwaukee on moving day.

My mom's life spans a century and a millennium and in a few years she will reach age 90. She is sharp as a tack and her eyesight puts my own to shame. When her body quits on her (like climbing the 14 steps she counted up to my apartment) her mind never fails. She can recall things that I cannot. She is a child of her age and isn't always completely comfortable with things I take for granted today like seeing multi-racial couples in a Milwaukee restaurant or the somewhat frequent use of the F word by Jourdan or me. But she is my mom and will always be my mom.

Sadly in all the time she spent I barely got any pictures of her but there are a few posted her including one when she was much younger and was photographed in a wedding party. She is Catherine Marie Lewallen Huys, age 83, a long time resident of Osceola, Indiana. She is my mom and I love her.