Life, and The Blog, Goes On

 May 8, 2012

When I first started transcribing mother’s tapes, it was a painful journey. Then I started really listening to the tapes. Most of the things she talked about were what I call “defining moments”, you know those things that had a hand in shaping the adults that we become, and I had heard them; but so many of them were new. Then there were stories that she would repeat. The first time it happened I almost fast forwarded to the next story. I am so glad I didn’t because I found out that the first telling was sometimes just the bones or skeleton of the story; the second telling was the meat and substance of the story.

I had looked into publishing mother’s memoirs; found that it was a highly unlikely thing to happen but went forward with transcribing anyway. Someone sent me a link to a blog they had seen and that made me look into “blogging”. It didn’t take me long to realize that here was a medium that would literally publish mother’s memoirs for family and friends and an occasional stranger to enjoy. It was my intention to transcribe mother’s tapes; place them on the blog, then go on my way.

But like many plans that we humans make there has been a twist that came at me out of left field. Like that long ago baseball that caught me in the throat and knocked me to my knees; I hope I have learned a lesson. No plan is set in concrete – all plans can be changed.

As I have sent links to Ms Alberta’s Memories and Recipes, I have received phone calls and ran into people and the conversation usually goes something like this:

“I saw the blog and I was wondering … ” with the next part going “ did she ever tell you about when ?” or “ did you know ?” and there has followed one of their memories of mother.

So as mother use to say about things, “It just took on a life of its own and went on from there.”