good­bye, Mamoo

The world is a dimin­ished place now, as my beloved grand­moth­er, Bet­tye Planque Wedek­ing Hor­rall, died last week, aged 98 years and 51 weeks.  She was our “Mamoo,” the matri­arch of our very close fam­i­ly, the moral com­pass of all our dis­parate gen­er­a­tions.  She was also just plain tremen­dous fun, always laugh­ing from the begin­ning of her long life to the end.

She was my moth­er’s moth­er, and as I get old­er, I see more resem­blance among the four gen­er­a­tions of our fam­i­ly’s lit­tle girls.  There is some­thing in the twin­kle of our eyes, I think.  Here is my moth­er, aged six.

Although my father’s Scan­di­na­vian genes turned both me and my daugh­ter blonde, we share that twin­kle, I think.  Here is lit­tle me, in the ubiq­ui­tous playpen of the 1960s.

Of course I believe Avery to be the best dis­til­la­tion of all our fam­i­ly’s won­der­ful qual­i­ties.  How proud Mamoo was of her, her first great-grand­child, daugh­ter of her first granddaughter.

Mamoo’s fam­i­ly name began as the Ger­man­ic “Planck” but the 1930s brought about a change to the more Frenchy spelling of “Planque.”  She was the adored baby of the fam­i­ly, lit­tle Bet­ty, adding the “e” to the end of her name as a teenag­er want­i­ng to be just a lit­tle dif­fer­ent.  It did­n’t take an extra let­ter on her name to achieve that.

She mar­ried my grand­fa­ther, Loyd Wedek­ing, as a very young woman and pro­ceed­ed to pro­duce a beau­ti­ful fam­i­ly with first my moth­er, Suzanne, then her lit­tle sis­ter Lin­da Jane, and final­ly a lit­tle broth­er, my uncle Ken­neth, named for my grand­fa­ther’s broth­er.  Here they all are, in bril­liant 1975 garb, in the sprawl­ing gar­den of their mag­i­cal south­ern Indi­ana home, Five Green Acres.

I loved that house more than any place in my child­hood: there was a rid­ing lawn­mow­er, end­less Big Wheel cars for us to roar around on, a bird­bath to mon­i­tor, woods to explore, and a com­plete­ly mag­i­cal rope swing from which my broth­er fell twice, break­ing the same wrist each time.  I nev­er had such bad luck.

While Mamoo was not a very enthu­si­as­tic cook, she was a superbly wel­com­ing host­ess.  We chil­dren longed for the week­ends spent with Mamoo and Grand­pa, and my par­ents felt much the same, since my father’s par­ents were far away in Ari­zona and in any case he felt much clos­er to my moth­er’s fam­i­ly.  Mamoo wel­comed the arrival of every one of her eight grand­chil­dren with sen­si­ble, unsen­ti­men­tal rejoic­ing.  She was not a hug­ger or a kiss­er, as befit­ted her gen­er­a­tion.  But she adored us all.  Here she is with tiny me, just hours old in a Feb­ru­ary snowstorm.

So many, many times we motored down to Wash­ing­ton to be togeth­er.  I don’t think any extend­ed fam­i­ly ever had more fun than we all did.  Here we are in 1967, at Christ­mas, com­plete with my Aunt Lin­da’s hus­band Uncle Dick, Uncle Ken­ny’s love­ly wife Aunt Mary Wayne (the bee­hive! and I think Tramp, their dog), my big cousin Steve, my big broth­er Andy, and lit­tle me, in my mom’s arms.

What did Mamoo do to make our time togeth­er so much fun?  She was rather plump in all the right cozy places, with soft­ly curl­ing brown hair and eyes always laugh­ing.  She pro­vid­ed my moth­er’s and aun­t’s beloved chi­na dolls com­plete with all the gor­geous 1950s clothes she had made for them: dress­es in silky blue-flow­ered mate­r­i­al, starched net pet­ti­coats peep­ing out from under lit­tle flan­nel skirts, hats and stock­ings and lit­tle shoes of real leather.  She sat us — my lit­tle cousin Amy and I — in the big dra­mat­ic bath­tub sur­round­ed with black shiny mar­ble walls, and sat with us as we splashed togeth­er, wash­ing the walls indus­tri­ous­ly with sham­poo.  We were the “Naked Baked Club,” my cousin and I, invent­ed under Mamoo’s watch­ful, lov­ing eye.  As we got old­er, she pro­duced even more inter­est­ing activ­i­ties like going through the box­es of let­ters my moth­er had writ­ten to her from col­lege, and her diaries.

She tied on half-aprons with ruf­fled edges and pro­duced large meals of sim­ple, deli­cious food around their big oval table, presided over by my large, laugh­ing grand­fa­ther.  There were copi­ous meat­loaves and mashed pota­toes with plen­ty of gravy, lit­tle glass and sil­ver dish­es of olives and cel­ery sticks, big bowls of but­tery green beans and my grand­fa­ther’s tra­di­tion­al bas­ket of plain white bread, with­out which a meal was not a meal. My grand­fa­ther con­vinced all we chil­dren that the end­less sup­ply of lit­tle sweet pick­les on their table came from his hid­den “pick­le bush.”  There was nev­er a pair of fun­nier, sweet­er grand­par­ents.  Strict, to be sure — we chil­dren behaved nice­ly.  But no won­der my moth­er and her sib­lings brought us there to Five Green Acres over and over for lov­ing week­ends, Christ­mases, Easters.

Under the giant ever­green tree in the back­ground of this pho­to, Mamoo hid end­less dozens of real East­er eggs, plus the plas­tic col­ored ones that broke in half to reveal foil-wrapped choco­late eggs, plus East­er bas­kets, lit­tle stuffed bun­nies, for we cousins to find.  I will nev­er for­get the East­er morn­ing when, scram­bling under the tree for eggs, we came upon one of those stuffed bun­nies.  And then it hopped away. Magic!

Through all our times togeth­er, Mamoo told sto­ries.  Some were from her child­hood with her adored old­er sis­ter, my Aunt Toot­sie, who had per­fect pitch and could play any song she’d heard, on the piano, first time per­fect.  All Mamoo’s fam­i­ly were the­atri­cal, dra­mat­ic and musi­cal.  Mamoo her­self was the only per­son I ever heard who whis­tled with real vibra­to.  She told us of Aunt Toot­sie’s cat­a­clysmic elope­ment as a teenag­er, the death of their father when Mamoo was only 16, their strug­gles with the Depres­sion, the peren­ni­al lack of mon­ey.  Many of these tales fol­lowed the clas­sic lines.  “When we were chil­dren, if we got even ONE ORANGE in our Christ­mas stock­ings, we felt lucky indeed.  And that was to SHARE!”

She and Grand­pa remem­bered every fun­ny thing their chil­dren had said, and the sto­ries were aired with every fam­i­ly gath­er­ing.  One of her favorites was the Thanks­giv­ing when my Uncle Ken­ny sought out Grand­pa, nap­ping after the mas­sive meal.  “He came up to your grand­fa­ther and tapped him on the shoul­der until he woke up.  Then he said, ‘Dad­dy, would you like a piece of turkey?’ “Sure,’ Grand­pa said, just to get rid of him.  After he ate it, your Uncle Ken­ny said, “Dad­dy, could you chew that piece of turkey?  Because I tried to, and could­n’t.’ ”  Then Mamoo would shake with laughter.

She and Grand­pa trav­eled the world, nev­er neglect­ing to vis­it us, stag­ger­ing in the back door of my child­hood home, near­ly hid­den behind enor­mous piles of Christ­mas presents.  When we first vis­it­ed them in their down­town hotel, I asked my moth­er, “What IS a hotel, any­way?”  She answered patient­ly, “It’s a big build­ing with lots of lit­tle rooms, where peo­ple stay when they are vis­it­ing.”  We trooped into the lob­by, wait­ed for the ele­va­tor (my first) and got in.  As the ele­va­tor waft­ed toward Mamoo’s floor, I said in a tiny voice, “This sure IS a lit­tle room!”

Then one chill Decem­ber day short­ly after our Thanks­giv­ing with Mamoo and Grand­pa, I came home from school to find my moth­er in the door­way, ter­ri­ble and tall with her face red and blotched with unbe­liev­able tears.  My moth­er nev­er, ever cried.  “Your Grand­pa, my Dad­dy, has died.  I must go be with Mamoo.  Dad will take care of you guys.”  And she was gone.  I remem­ber sit­ting on the kitchen counter, watch­ing my father fold laun­dry with total­ly unac­cus­tomed awk­ward­ness, hear­ing him tell the awful tale.  “Grand­pa went to the hos­pi­tal for his retire­ment phys­i­cal, the day before he was going to retire.  He was on the heart machine when it sud­den­ly went off like crazy.  He died of a heart attack right then and there.”

Mamoo told us the sto­ry from her per­spec­tive lat­er.  “I was expect­ing your grand­fa­ther home for lunch as usu­al, and the time got on.  Just as I was start­ing to wor­ry, there was a knock on the door.  It was the doc­tor, walked down the hill from the hos­pi­tal with the news.”  Lat­er on, a wing of that hos­pi­tal, and the lit­tle road lead­ing to my grand­par­ents’ house, were named after my grand­fa­ther who had been the kind and lov­ing optometrist in that lit­tle town all his adult life.

It took Mamoo a long time to recov­er her twin­kle, after that.  Once when we were vis­it­ing her after the funer­al, I saw a cal­en­dar on her kitchen wall.  Writ­ten on it for the day before, and sev­er­al days before that, was, “Alone.  Again.”  They had been mar­ried just over 40 years.

She came, as always, to our plays and musi­cals, and we went often to see her, know­ing that noth­ing could com­fort her for her loss, but fear­ing to leave her alone.  The months crept by in a new sense of loss and change.  I was twelve years old.

Then, after a peri­od of mourn­ing, Mamoo sat us all down to tell us an extra­or­di­nary tale.  “Your grand­fa­ther’s best friend, Lon Hor­rall, has come to me to say that he loves me, and would like to get mar­ried.  So we think we will.”  It was a love sto­ry that made their ages com­plete­ly irrel­e­vant.  Lon had sur­vived two wives, brave­ly sol­dier­ing on in their social cir­cle in that lit­tle Indi­ana town, secret­ly nurs­ing a pas­sion for my grand­moth­er, we all decid­ed.  Then when tragedy struck, he was there to pick up the pieces.

Mamoo and Lon began a new life togeth­er, we gained a new grand­fa­ther — the only one the lit­tle cousins real­ly ever remem­bered — and sev­er­al step­cousins.  We grew up under Lon’s slight­ly stricter but equal­ly lov­ing gaze, feel­ing pro­found­ly grate­ful to him for sav­ing Mamoo from her wid­ow­hood, and offer­ing a sec­ond chance at happiness.

The sum­mer fam­i­ly reunions, a tra­di­tion since the grand­chil­dren first start­ed arriv­ing, con­tin­ued.  Mamoo and Lon treat­ed us all to a gala din­ner, the air ring­ing with many sto­ries being told all at once.

When I elect­ed to go to grad­u­ate school in Penn­syl­va­nia, Mamoo and Lon stepped in imme­di­ate­ly.  “I don’t know why you want to leave the good old Mid­west for some snooty East­ern town, but as long as you do, we might as well dri­ve you and your things out there.”  And they did, all 900 miles of the jour­ney, and since there was not a hotel room to be found when we arrived, Lon slept in the car, and Mamoo on the mat­tress from my bed, on the floor.  “I did­n’t sleep a wink,” she said proud­ly in the morn­ing.  “Oh yes, you did,” I rejoined silent­ly to myself.  Mamoo had a fierce snore.

We got mar­ried, one by one, and Lon and Mamoo were there to cel­e­brate with us.  Here we are at my wed­ding, in the ecru dress Mamoo had made for Aunt Lin­da, which my moth­er had worn, and which was refit­ted for me.

My dear dad need­ed a lit­tle help with his bou­ton­niere, and Mamoo was there to help.

As indeed, Mamoo always was there to help.  As strong and rather old-fash­ioned as Mamoo was about her opin­ions of right and wrong, noth­ing was stronger than her love for her fam­i­ly.  That was nev­er clear­er than just before our wed­ding, when we bought some old, sweet fur­ni­ture at the sum­mer reunion in Wash­ing­ton.  “Now, how are you kids going to get that fur­ni­ture out to New Jer­sey?” she asked stern­ly.  “I guess we’ll hire a van,” I said.  “Non­sense.  What a waste of mon­ey.  Lon and I will dri­ve out, and deliv­er it to you.”  And they did, those two near­ly-80-year-olds, stay­ing under our unmar­ried roof with per­fect, if slight­ly dis­ap­prov­ing aplomb.  And I can assure you that each piece of fur­ni­ture went in the spot where Mamoo thought it would look best.

Mamoo grew soft­er as she grew old­er, and there were hugs, with her soft and pow­der-fra­grant cheek against mine.  And noth­ing could keep her from dot­ing on her first great-grand­child, my daugh­ter Avery, com­plet­ing four gen­er­a­tions of our family.

Sev­er­al  years lat­er, it was my lit­tle sis­ter Jil­l’s turn for a beau­ti­ful wedding.

Mamoo and Lon lived out their twi­light years with great, qui­et hap­pi­ness.  We moved to New York, and then to Lon­don, and my vis­its with them became few­er and few­er.  I lis­tened with great nos­tal­gia to my moth­er telling me about Thanks­giv­ing din­ners I was miss­ing, fam­i­ly reunions I was miss­ing.  Avery nev­er real­ly knew Mamoo and Lon very well, but I have no doubt she feels she did, because I just might have inher­it­ed my grand­moth­er’s pen­chant for telling a sto­ry, over and over.

Four years ago, Lon had a heart attack from which it was obvi­ous he would not recov­er.  They were sep­a­rat­ed.  His fam­i­ly stepped in to pro­vide a nurs­ing home for him, and my fam­i­ly set­tled Mamoo into a nurs­ing home of her own, staffed by lov­ing ladies and gen­tle­man who nev­er tired of telling us what a won­der­ful guest she was, regal­ing every­one in the mid­dle of the night at the nurs­es’ sta­tion with tale after tale of her fam­i­ly life.  When Lon died, my fam­i­ly went to tell her.  “Oh, what a shame,” she said, shak­ing her head.  “He was a love­ly man.  So hard-work­ing.”  We think she had retreat­ed into a place where she was still mar­ried to my grand­fa­ther, remem­ber­ing his best friend with fond­ness, rather than the sec­ond hus­band to whom she had been mar­ried for 30 years.

I last saw Mamoo a year and a half ago in her nurs­ing home.  Her mem­o­ry was fail­ing then, but only for the present-day.  The past still made per­fect sense.  “Well, look who’s here!” she exclaimed.  “Now, hon­ey, did you bring John and Avery with you?”  We talked about Lon­don and her vis­its there with Grand­pa in the 1950s and 60s, and Avery’s school adven­tures and our new home, of which I had brought pic­tures.  She want­ed to dis­cuss, as always, the place­ment of each piece of fur­ni­ture, the arrange­ment I had made of books on shelves, what sort of neigh­bor­hood it was.  She was her­self, indomitably curi­ous and sharp.

But noth­ing can last for­ev­er, as we found last week.  We all talked about her con­di­tion in the days lead­ing to her death.  “She is peace­ful,” my moth­er assured me, and we knew we were for­tu­nate.  She had had a long, impos­si­bly hap­py, gen­er­ous, fun­ny life, leav­ing behind three chil­dren, eight grand­chil­dren, eleven great-grand­chil­dren and anoth­er on the way, due any day.  She died on Feb­ru­ary 1, just six days before her 99th birthday.

Intan­gi­bly, what Mamoo left behind more than any­thing else were her love of life in all its com­pli­ca­tions, her love of the past, her deter­mi­na­tion to keep it alive, and her love of her fam­i­ly.  Her death is, real­ly, a loss with­out any need for grief.  Noth­ing was left undone or unsaid.  She died as she had lived, full of appre­ci­a­tion for what­ev­er life had to offer.  Yes­ter­day my band of bell­ringers rang for Sun­day ser­vices in her hon­or, my beloved teacher read­ing out her name.  Every­one gath­ered around and asked me love­ly ques­tions about her life.  And for once, in my ring­ing I made no mis­takes.  How touched and amazed she would have been to know.

Good­bye, Mamoo, and thank you.