Mother's Day is around the corner and of course, I am thinking of my Mom, Dorothy Stanton Outlaw. We lost her in 2013. She lived to be 94. I wrote this poem in her honor years ago and gave it to her. She had it framed and hung it in her kitchen.
Mashing for Five
She stood at the sink with
the big pot of steaming hot potatoessafely stowed there for mashing.
She used a common implement made of
curlicue metal attached to a worn wooden
handle, known as the potato masher.The noise that Mom made
mashing the potatoes for dinner
was a predominant sound of
my childhood. Most nights,some ten minutes before dinner,
we heard the mashing noise throughout
the house, a certain clackety-clack,
clackety-clack, clackety, clackety, clackety-clack that comes back to me now
clear as a hymn or a heartbeat,
almost jazzy, our mother orchestrating
dinner, our mother so Irish and hard working, mashing and fluffing, mashing and fluffing,
adding the milk and Blue Bonnet margarine
and giving the masher a final whack against
the rim of the pot before setting it aside to tend to the meat and vegetables.
Only occasionally did I notice
the little sighs Mom made, those
sick-of-cooking-for-a-family-of-five sighs,those this-must-be-my-three-thousandth-pot-
of-potatoes sighs, but I write this poem
to recognize them now, and to celebrate
the rhythm of her mashing so fondly recalled,clackety-clack, clackety-clack,
clackety, clackety, clackety-clack......
- Keddy Ann Outlaw
The photo above shows Mom with me, her firstborn. To see her so young and happy, joyous in motherhood, is wonderful, a tonic for my spirits.
I have to tell you, despite the sighs I wrote about in the poem, mashed potatoes were one of her favorite foods up till the end... She once told me she would love to just eat a big bowl of them for dinner, especially if someone else made them, which I often did when I visited her in the last few years of her life. Love you, Mom! And I will say again what I often said to her over the phone on Mother's Day -- Mom, thank you for giving me life.
