My Motorcycle Momma

It was a small apartment, dark and quiet. Mom and I arrived in Canada to start our new life with dad. He came before us to get things settled. We arrived after the war in 1952, I was eleven months old. There were many ups and downs for my parents, but they did their best to make things good for me and each of my siblings. I am the oldest of 6, my second sibling died, he was only three days old. Mom had toxemia and nearly died too.

This woman, my mom, proved to be a mix of characters over the years. She was happy, she was sad, she was depressed, she became frantic at times, but determined and strong willed.

She loved to travel and when things were somewhat financially ok to travel, she took me to Europe. She took me to see where I was born in England and then to visit family in Austria and Switzerland where I had my eighth birthday. Mom was not afraid to explore. I watched as she talked to everyone, we went on trains to different cities in Europe and up mountains in Austria with my uncles and in Switzerland with my aunt. I have a wonderful memory of lying on our backs in sweet smelling grass on the mountain and looking up into the blue sky with clouds sailing by so slowly and so close, you could almost reach out and touch them. A cold mountain stream trickled nearby to quench our thirst.

Both my mom and my aunt had traumatic events during the war, which I am sure created some of this fearlessness. This fearlessness soon gave me such a scare in Switzerland. Picture being way up on this mountain, so serene and beautiful. You could not hear the village below. Overlooking the edge of a cliff were these thick vines like an umbrella-shaped cluster that literally hung over the edge. My aunt went and sat on them. I was so afraid that those vines would break, and she would fall off that cliff to her death. Talk about being fearless!

Mom took on various jobs to help support us. Dad was sick a lot in those early years. She eventually got a waitress job in Niagara Falls at a restaurant called the Refractory. It had the best view of Niagara Falls. She would take my sister and I with her to the restaurant in the morning to help her fill the sugar bowls, and the salt and pepper shakers on each table. She had to set the tables in the morning and make sure each table in her section was ready for the guests. Her serving shift then began at 4 pm. She was always in a rush, always running late, and this created an atmosphere of stress and anxiety until she left for work. Now looking back, I realize the work involved caring for 5 children, a husband who was ill, trying to keep the house together and cooking and shopping, oh my! No wonder she was stressed.

I was 3 years old when Hurricane Hazel hit. “Hazel, the deadliest and costliest storm of the 1954 Atlantic hurricane season, reached Toronto, Ontario by the evening of October 15, 1954. It peaked as a category 4 storm, but by the time it reached Canada, it was an extratropical category 1 storm after merging with an existing cold front south of Ontario.” - Effects of Hurricane Hazel in Canada – Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effects_of_Hurricane_Hazel_in_Canada.

It came so far inland flooding rain and high winds. I looked out the window, and garbage cans were flying down the street. It was so scary. Yet my fearless mom still drove to work, in a hurricane!!!

Mom could talk to strangers. She made so many friends and acquaintances and she would keep in contact with them for years. I couldn’t connect so easily with strangers. I was too shy. How could she just strike up a conversation with a total stranger? It took several years for me to get up the courage to speak to strangers at a network meeting and then to speak to a small group. I suppose I acquired some of her spunk and determination somehow, like my mom did.

My husband might call it being stubborn. I know what I want and need now, and I go after it. A lesson learned, go after it today, yesterday is gone and tomorrow never comes.

Mom was always taking pictures. She always had a camera and developed the pictures, not one, but several copies. It’s not like today where everything is digital. I think perhaps it is better to have the hard copy of a photo. You can “feel” it and in a sense experience the event or the emotion around that time of the photo. We have some amazing memories looking at those photos.

Over time some of these events get lost in our memory. Then there is a photo, that brings back memories of sad times and lots of happy times. I am sure most of you had a mom or dad taking pictures all the time. “Oh no not another one, mom!” in exasperation. Or “hurry up mom take the picture already!!” One of my favourite photos of my mom was taken when I was nine or ten. It was a family photo taken at Effingham Park in Pelham, Ontario. She was wearing this gorgeous yellow taffeta dress. She looked so beautiful, and I thought of her as a Hollywood star. I wish I could have saved that dress it was a classic style.

Both of my parents were creatively talented. Mom learned cake decorating. She made many birthday cakes over the years. Some of the famous ones where the clown cakes, with an ice cream cone hat decorated in butter cream icing. She made some beautiful masterpieces, including my wedding cake. I followed her creativity in decorating cakes, first to make birthday cakes for my three children and then my grandchildren. Eventually I opened my own shop to make wedding cakes, floral arrangements, and bouquets.

Mom and dad had many arguments and soon it was too much for them, and after 35 years they split up. It was hard to accept but eventually we understood that it was better for each of them. It was not easy for my younger two siblings. I did not know until years later that she did not handle it very well when dad left and took it out on my youngest sister and brother. It was a time when I did not like my mom very much. Until you are a parent and can understand some of the stresses of parenting, dealing with hardships, mental health issues and a separation it is difficult to comprehend.

I was eighteen when I left home. If I had been a little more mature, a little more understanding, patient, I don’t know, could I have helped my mom and siblings get through it? Perhaps not. It was something that life had us go through. What lessons did I learn from that experience? It depends on what you focus on in life that either gets you through it or not. I had focused on the negative for so long I started to play the “victim”. Until I realized that I created my own negative world with negative thoughts nothing would change. Once I changed my focus, amazing things happened. It took many years to discover that the thoughts you think can change your world and your focus.

Dad went to be with a friend, and they were a “couple” for several years. It made it difficult for my mom, and I remember that mom once commented that “it was worse than having your partner die. It was a living death.”

Courageously they both grew to accept it, and move on, and I think it was more for us kids. They were “friends”, and we had our parents together at family events and holidays. The third person in the mix, who used to be her friend, also came to these family events and after a while mom accepted her. There was a peaceful gathering at family times. Looking back, she had a hard time with it, but was strong enough to let the emotions go eventually. That is when she became that fearless mom, soon to be a motorcycle rider.

Remember I said she loved to travel? Well mom went on a trip, by herself. No friend came with her to Los Angeles, to Hawaii, and to some other places in the US I don’t know about. This strong woman overcame what could have completely, and utterly destroyed her emotionally and mentally. She did what she wanted to do for as long as she could. Mom became a women’s libber before it was cool.

In her 50’s she became my Motorcycle Momma. She bought a motorcycle, a Honda Touring bike. It was a big bike that was meant for long distance travel. She joined a motorcycle club called the Motor Maids an International Club and they joined various other events with the International Retreads Motorcycle Club.

She had answered a request for a female companion rider, Dorothy was a newbie. Mom was the only one who reached out to Dorothy and inspired her to ride. Dorothy Seaborne went on to write a book, called I Did - You Can Too. Dorothy thanked mom in the book for her support. These motorcycle riders went everywhere and did toy drives to collect stuffed toys for kids in the hospital. They were a bunch of fun-loving people, various ages, who looked out for each other.

There were a few times she would drive that motorcycle into the circle where we lived and give the kids a thrill-ride around the circle. She loved all her grandchildren and she loved making people happy.

She lobbied to get the local police their bullet-proof jackets, she was the president of a senior’s group in the apartment complex where she lived. She beautified the gardens around the apartment. Rubber tire gardening elevated the garden beds, so the seniors did not have to bend down. She loved gardening and new practically every flower name, herb, and weed. She knew what the herbs were good and which weeds had medicinal use.

I remember once when were kids she found a recipe to make cough syrup out of juniper berries. Yuck it, was so awful! Not sure if Buckley’s or mom’s juniper cough syrup was worse. For obvious reasons she did not make that one again.

Eventually she had to give up riding. The doctors discovered that she had three leaking heart valves, a result from having rheumatic fever when she was eleven. She never knew all those years about this heart condition. She just kept on doing things. She commented not too long after the diagnosis, that this heart condition explains why she could never keep up with the other kids running and playing.

She had heart surgery, where they replaced two of the valves with pig’s valves. The pig’s valves only last about ten years. The third valve was in the back of the heart where they could not get to it. Literally ten years after those valves were put in, they started to fail. She was a trooper until she could not take care of herself anymore. She came to live with me for a year.

She loved the movie, The Sound of Music. It was filmed just north of where she was from, Zeltweg, and it brought back many memories of Austria, her childhood, the war and having to leave her family to go to a foreign country. I watched it with her, and it was exceedingly difficult as she cried, and I cried. To this day I cannot watch the movie without crying and thinking of her. I will remember that day forever watching the movie with her, and I cry every time.

My motorcycle momma took on challenges and tried to make the best of things. There were so many challenges over the years from war time PTSD, (which we know now), financial stress, health issues, a breakup and finally her heart.

It is easier to look in hindsight to realize what I learned from my mom. At the time I went through most of these life events, I did not understand or acknowledge the lessons to be learned.

Looking back now, I learned to be independent, strong, to have courage through challenges. I learned compassion and the issues surrounding mental illness. I learned to be friendly and talk to people. It was difficult at first as I struggled with “speaking up” from a childhood incident. Now at 70, I realize there was a lot I had learned and which I appreciate now. There are so many questions I should have asked both my parents, but never did. Now it is too late. I still have the photos, the memories, the experiences that have helped me get through some of my life challenges. Now I know my purpose. My purpose grew from some of these lessons and experiences as I watched my Motorcycle Momma take on the challenges. She passed away in 2003.

Sending my parents heavenly love and hugs. I miss you both.