The day I left home, it was 1981; I was 24 and married for almost three months. No, my husband and I did not live with my parents after our marriage. I did. My husband was an active duty Army officer stationed in Germany and he had been in Germany for the entire year prior to our wedding. I lived in Ohio and I was finishing my last year of college. He came home on leave one week before the wedding. The day before our wedding, I was commissioned a second Lieutenant in the Army through the ROTC program at my university. After a two-week honeymoon in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida in the middle of December (we were married Dec. 20), we arrived back at my parents’ home in Ohio and spent another week together before he was back off to his assignment in Germany. In February of 1981, I finally left home for Ft. Gordon, GA on my own for a three-month Signal Officer’s Basic Course. I did not reunite with my husband again until late May or early June of that same year.
The morning I drove out of my parent’s drive was gray and chilly. The weather definitely DID NOT match my spirits. I was exhilarated! I was finally going to be out on my own. There was nothing my mother could do to stop me now! I was leaving home “the right way.” My mother’s words…not mine.
My mother was “old school”. Born in Italy in 1931 and raised a Roman Catholic, she spent a lifetime mastering the fine art of “feeling guilty”. She immigrated into the United States at the age of 15, and lived with her parents until she married my father when she was 23. As I grew up, I was always told that being married and having children was the ultimate thing to experience, and if I did, I would not want for more. Or….SHOULDN ‘T want for more. On the few occasions I expressed a desire to be out on my own “without” a husband, I was threatened with disownment. I was told that if I did that, I couldn’t count on my parents for any kind of help if I ever needed it. So, I lived at home. Telling my parents I was joining the Army was a harrowing experience, to say the least. It is a story in itself, so I won’t go into it here. I’ll leave it for another time. Lucky for me, it was the military that introduced me to my first husband, so when I finally did leave home, it was with full parental (mostly maternal) blessing. My father always followed my mother’s lead.
Adrenaline was running high through my veins the morning I left. I was ready for the two-day drive alone. As I kissed my mother and father good bye, Daddy’s last words to me were, “It’s not too late to change your mind, you know. You can still fly.”
“No, Daddy. I am doing this, “and I pulled out into the street. I turned and waved good-bye. I haven’t been back to live since. I’ve been home many times to visit. And since my children have grown up and are out on their own, I often wonder what my life would be like had I chosen to move back home after my divorce. I sometimes grow nostalgic for the smells of Northeastern Ohio in the summer where I grew up. I get hungry for Handel’s Homemade Ice Cream that originated in my hometown. I sometimes yearn for the close companionship of my extended family on a more regular basis and wonder…will I ever move back?
I still have my mother. She turned 83 years old this past May. She is a remarkable woman. Unfortunately, I lost my father in 2004. As my mother has aged, she has become more and more progressive. I love her dearly. I strive to be like her every day.
Here is my project for this week. I am using one of my favorite stamp sets again…Kinda Eclectic.
I used the emboss resist technique on this card. What’s that? Well, I am gonna tell you!.. 🙂
Using a Versa Mark ink pad, I stamped the image I wanted to emboss. In this case, it was the sun burst from the Kinda Eclectic stamp set. I then sprinkled Crushed Curry embossing powder over it and heated it with my heat tool.
Then, I used a sponge and Lost Lagoon ink and sponged over the embossed image, drying to get the color to fade off into a lighter shade in the bottom right corner. When I finished sponging, I wiped the embossed image off with a piece of tissue to remove the excess ink. And there you go…the ink does not adhere to the embossed image. I think this turned out kinda sweet, don’t you?
I hope you enjoyed your visit here today and the time you spent reading my ramblings. Hope it wasn’t too boring. Until next time…
Happy Stamping!
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