Guest Column: The Lowe Down: Lessons from my Mama . . .

By Pam Lowe

This Mother’s Day my sister and I will continue our tradition of giving our mom a corsage and calling it, as Gomer Pyle did in an episode of the Andy Griffith Show, “corsāge”. I will paraphrase Gomer as I do every year and say to my mom, “It wouldn’t be right for you, Mary Grace, to go unadorned.” We quote that show quite often, my mother and I. That particular quote comes from the episode “A Date for Gomer” where the annual Chamber of Commerce dance is coming up and Thelma Lou’s cousin, Mary Grace is coming to town and they have to find a date for her or Thelma Lou and Helen will not go to the dance with Barney and Andy. Although all episodes of that show are funny; this one is a dandy.

Another of our family traditions concerning the Mother’s Day corsage is one many families also adhere to and it’s the color of the flower(s) in the spray. My grandmother taught us that a woman is to wear white flowers if her mother is no longer living and red flowers if her mother is alive to celebrate Mother’s Day. Seven years ago after the passing of my grandma, our time-honored custom of giving our mother red flowers on her corsage changed to white. The alabaster flowers are an acute reminder that someone dear is missing and although they are an aching reminder of our family’s loss, it also reveres and continues to honor her in the very same way she exalted her own mother, Alice.

I learned what it means to be a daughter through watching my mom’s lifelong loyalty and her sense of loving duty in her care and relationship with her parents; my grandparents. She was and remains a devoted daughter after their passing. She continues to honor them with her memories and living her life the way she was raised; kind, loving, with an unwavering faith in God and love of family. She visits their gravesites regularly and decorates them, just as my grandma taught her to honor family.

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