This year, Mother’s Day falls on my Dad’s birthday.  He would have been 103!  I think he would have been pleased that the Jean Maries that he planted along the east fence are all in bloom for such an auspicious date.

This is the third time since Dad’s death and the second time since Mom’s passing that Mother’s Day has fallen on May 12^th.  The occasions converged in 1996 and, again, in 2002.  I think I notice because the final time we celebrated with both Mom and Dad on a May 12^th Mother’s Day was just a few days before he was diagnosed with brain cancer.  He lived less than three more months.

So, this is a bitter-sweet day for me – full of memories of both my folks, but especially of my father.  They were opposites in many ways which is probably what made them a great team.  My mother was the flamboyant one, the extrovert, the people-person; Dad was more contemplative, more conservative, yet less judgmental.  Mom always said it was his “Bostonian upbringing.”  Maybe so.

Dad never met someone he didn’t like.  He especially admired people who had become successful financially – a goal is always aspired to but never attained.  He was also a worrier – again, often about their precarious financial situation.  I remember him pacing back and forth on Sunday mornings during the war years as he listened to the NBC symphony orchestra broadcasts over the radio.  Unfortunately, I was too young to understand that the music was soothing for him.  I still associate classical music with some sort of mysterious unhappiness.

I remember, too, the twinkle in his eye and the smile that played at the corners of his mouth when Mom did or said something a little outrageous.  He adored her and the older I get, the more I realize, that he spent much of his life in a supporting role, making it possible for Mom to be herself.

That was so, in the little things, as well as the big:  Mom was messy; Dad was neat.  It was second nature for him to straighten and tidy after Mom had torn through the house like an enthusiastic tornado.  Mom had the great ideas and grand schemes (saving Oysterville); Dad worked tirelessly at the details that would bring them to fruition (putting Oysterville on the National Register of Historic Places.)

Dad was the one I went to when I was troubled and seeking advice.  I thought of him as the ‘Voice of Reason.’  Mom, on the other hand, was the one who provided inspiration.  I feel fortunate that they were my parents and grateful for this day that seems especially created so I can honor them both.  Happy Mother’s Day, Mom and Happy Birthday, Dad!

I often think of the month of May as belonging to my maternal grandmother, Helen Richardson Espy.  That’s because of two dates, May 5^th and May 28^th — datesthat more-or-less bracket the month.  The latter date was her birthday and the former, of course, is Cinco de Mayo.

Daniel Richardson

My grandmother was born in Mexico City on May 28, 1878.  Her father, Daniel Richardson, was attached to the American Legation there where he served from 1875 to 1879 in various assignments – as secretary, as consul general, and as chargé d’affaires.  Her mother, Annie Medora Taylor, was an American expatriate whose family had fled the war-ravaged South shortly after the end of the Civil War.

Dan and Annie met when he was 24 and she was just 18.  She had been raised in a household sympathetic to the ‘Southern Cause’ and had long since vowed that she would never marry a short man, a blond man, or a damnyankee.  Dan Richardson was all three.  Apparently, Dan had a lot of charisma; it took him less than a year to woo and marry the beautiful, auburn-haired Annie.

Family matters called Dan home to East Oakland, California in March 1879.  He returned, according to the account written by my Uncle Willard, with a bride, an infant, a nurse, four peons to carry the baby’s litter, and fifty cavalrymen to ward off bandits.  (Now that’s what I call travelling in style!)

Annie Medora Taylor Richardson

Although my great-grandmother lived in the United States for the rest of her life, her heart remained in Mexico.  Wrote Willard:  To her dying day, Grandma Richardson never felt at home in Yankee surroundings…Mexico remained her heart’s home.  When General Diaz fell ill at the time President Garfield was shot, grandma’s whole concern was for the sick Mexican;  Her Richardson in-laws explained to her, using charts, that our own President was her husband’s sixth cousin once remove, but she could not have cared less whether Garfield lived or died.

The small beaded glass salsa dishes in our china cupboard are reminders of my grandmothers Mexican ‘heritage,’ as is the memory of her soft r’s which we all knew were vestigial reminders that she had spoken only Spanish for her first six years – until she began school.  Her recipe book, too, contains notations regarding flan and Spanish rice and other dishes that were favorites because they reminded her of her mother.

I sometimes wonder if Cinco de Mayo would have meant anything to my grandmother or great-grandmother.  Or, did it become a popular holiday much, much later?  No matter, really.  For me, the date serves as a pleasant reminder of some of my favorite family stories and of the long-ago connection with Mexico that has always made it seem a place of color and romance to me.