Mom worked as a volunteer teacher's helper at South Marshall Elementary School for two years. She always loved being around children and sought out this opportunity to be with them in a classroom setting. She knew most of them and their parents and had two of her own great granddaughters in class during those years.
On March 12, 1990 she wrote a piece she titled - "Being Happier" - which seems to me to be directed to her grandchildren and great grandchildren. I am certain her time at the school with the young kids brought all this to mind. I share it with you here because it is typical of her wit, humor and wisdom.
"We should all learn to be happier by getting back to the basics, going back to the principles we learned in Kindergarten. This concept of life is thought of as a school for children to develop mental, moral and physical traits by games and activities that make use of their natural tendency to express themselves in action.
Share everything - Play fair - Don't hit people - Put things back where you found them - Clean up your own mess - Don't take things that aren't yours - Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody - Wash your hands before you eat - Flush the toilet - Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you.
Live a balanced life - learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work some every day.
Take a nap every afternoon and when you go out into the world, watch for traffic, hold hands and stick together - be alert at all times, Stop - Look - Listen!
Always remember the Golden Rule "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you".
Love - Sane living - Ecology - Personal hygiene and Equality are all important things to keep clean and eliminate the spread of disease in our world.
When we apply these principles that we have known all our lives we have better families, better government and a much better world. They hold true and clear and are a firm foundation to a happier life in all simplicity. Train our children with the basics. Frosty & Mema"
Mom tried very hard to keep me clean all my life. My grandaddy (her father) told me many times he feared she would wash and scrub all my hide off when I was a young kid. I have memories from early childhood when she would dress me in a starched white shirt and bow tie with short pants and always shined shoes to go to church on Sunday. At some point I finally grew enough that she relaxed her "church clothes" rule and allowed me to at least wear long pants.
I will have to say that to some extent it must have rubbed off on me because one of the primary reasons the Rose told me she agreed to go out with me was that I had clean fingernails, shined shoes and smelled good. In those days I wore English Leather because I never really cared much for Old Spice (my Mom's choice for me) and those were about the only two men's fragrances available at the time.
Solomon wrote - "The lips of the righteous nourish many" and "The mouth of the righteous brings forth wisdom." Proverbs 10:21,31 NIV
I praise my heavenly Father for a righteous, amazing Mema who, even as a young mother, had the wisdom to teach me the principles she recited above in her journal. I heard those words many, many times and only really learned to appreciate them when I too had children to train.
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