l2fpphyllis

Goddesses Among Us

"Willy"
Christina Wilhemina (Daling) Stehower

Of the two of the women who influenced my life the most, I have only known one in the physical world – my Mother. My Grandmother, Jantina (Hoogewind) Daling, died before I was born. Although I never knew her, the stories of her strength have left their mark on me.

Neither of the women knew the Goddess, their strength came from the higher power that I refer to as the Universe and they, of course, based in Christianity. For me, in my studies, I have come to believe the basis of strength and power is really only a matter of semantics.

Grandma and Grandpa came to the United States in the early part of the last century from the Netherlands. Grandpa was a soldier for hire – which meant he served in the army in the place of wealthy sons whose fathers could pay for the service from others. Evidently Grandpa was well aware of the political climate of Europe and left for the United States well before the start of World War I. Grandma was pregnant with their third child on the trip. Imagine the crossing, the seasickness, caring for two young children and the fear of heading off into the unknown.

As with most immigrants they came through Ellis Island but eventually settled in New Era, Michigan – a part of Michigan where many Dutch came to live. The story is told of how Grandma sent my Uncle John to the store with a note pinned to his inside coat pocket along with two cents. It was the family’s last two cents and Grandma needed milk for the baby. Grandma spoke no English and a neighbor wrote the note for her. Uncle John later earned his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan and taught at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich.

Grandpa eventually found work in Grand Rapids as a cement worker or bricklayer. The family had grown to include seven children when Grandpa purchased a farm outside of Grand Rapids and moved the family to a bleak tar-papered shack in the early winter. My aunts tell the story of heading out of Grand Rapids in the gathering darkness of winter – all bundled up and riding in a sleigh – passing many of the fine, stately homes on West Leonard Road. “Maybe that’s the house, or that one.” They remember how silent the sleigh became as they pulled into the driveway of their new home.

According to my Aunts, if Grandma was upset, she never let it show. She set up housekeeping and established a fine home for her family. Adding two more children – my mother and Uncle Martin – to her brood before she was finally finished bearing children.

The farm grew and prospered. My mother and Aunts and Uncles attended a one-room schoolhouse during the winter and fall and helped on the farm during the summer. When the farm was ravaged with scarlet fever – which left my mother partially deaf – Grandma took care of the children who became sick. She had little help. Grandpa and Uncle Jim lived in a tent in the front yard and managed to escape the fever. Every day anything that was touched by anyone who was sick was boiled – including all bedding. Although the farm became quarantined (they were Dairy farmers) because Grandpa and Uncle Jim managed to avoid the fever and the quarantine was lifted from their farm before those of their neighbors.

Grandma must have been fairly homesick at times. She missed things from her home and at one point sent for a pair of wooden shoes to wear in the field – she had a huge market garden which she and my mother and Uncle John tended. They took their produce to the Farmers Market in Grand Rapids twice a week. This money was used to help pay for Uncle John’s college education. When the shoes arrived Grandma didn’t find them as comfortable as she remembered them, so they were seldom worn. I have those wooden shoes and they serve as a reminder of what life must have been like. I can’t wear them – even if they weren’t more than 75 years old – Grandma must have had very small feet. Grandma and Grandpa went back to the Netherlands only once for a visit – sometime after World War II.

Grandma cooked on a woodstove until well after most of their children married. She washed the family’s clothes in a washtub and later – after electricity was brought to the farm – in a wringer washer. Her strength of character often makes me ashamed of myself when I complain about things I consider travesties in my life. She truly was a Goddess in my eyes. My mother has said on many occasions that when she and her siblings would complain of being bored or that there was nothing to do (can you imagine with all the work that must have been done) Grandma would tell them to go out into the yard and search for a blue stone. I often carry a blue stone in my pocket as a reminder of my Grandmother.

My mother took many lessons from my Grandmother. She speaks fondly of her childhood. For my mother, as a child of Dutch immigrants, it was always very important to her that my sisters and I speak properly. Growing up in West Michigan surrounded by children who were also first and second-generation U.S. citizens it was easy for us to pick up Dutch slang and colloquialisms. Inserting a word like “brookie” or adding an “oh, hah” into our speech would bring out a rush of Dutch cursing – and then of course an apology – that was quite comical. My sisters and I will still occasionally insert some sort of slang into our conversations with Mom – simply to exasperate her.

When Mom finished the eighth grade her education was complete. Only one of my Aunts attended high school and when she became pregnant it was the end of any further education for the rest of the females in the family. The only complaint I ever heard from my mother was “It was pretty depressing to be 12 years old and not have any more school to go to.”

My mother met my father when he and some friends drove out to the farm to look at a car one of my Uncles was selling. Apparently Dad was somewhat of a “naughty” boy and Mom found it quite appealing.

Dad joined the Air Corps shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and served in London as a fireman during the war. It was his job to put out fires on the bombers as they returned from missions over Germany. That’s all I know about what he did. He will not talk much about it. We’ve always respected his silence.

While Dad was away Mom went to Ann Arbor to help my Uncle and his wife with their children. Mom said it was Uncle John’s way of getting her off the farm and out into the world. In addition to taking care of the children (my Aunt was a nurse at the University of Michigan hospital) Mom also worked at Willow Run Airport during this time. She cleaned and mounted machine guns on the bombers before they were shipped to Europe or the Pacific.

When Dad learned he was to come home on leave in August of 1945, he asked my mother to marry him. If she had reservations about marrying a man she hadn’t seen for three years, she did not voice them. She waited for him for three days after he arrived in Michigan. Dad, it turned out spent those three days on a Lake Michigan beach in Grand Haven. His excuse, “Gee, Chrissy, the girls were so glad to see us we had a hard time getting away.” Ironically they retired to Grand Haven and will be celebrating their 60^th wedding anniversary this summer.

After they had been married several years and had two children, Mom and Dad eventually moved to a small West Michigan town where my father had a job as a factory manager. Mom became very involved in civic, political and church activities and became quite well known in the church community as an inspirational speaker. I wish I had paid more attention to her speaking engagements back then.

Always described by others as “a classy woman,” she was very involved with a conservative political party. She served as a delegate to a national convention and was invited to a presidential inaugural ball. If my less-than-conservative leanings upset her, she has never let on. (My father, however, loves to argue with me – simply for the sake of a good argument).

I remember one occasion when a congressman was coming to the area and Mom was to host a Women’s Tea at our home. My parents thought it would be a good idea to have the cement poured for a new patio they were planning so the tea could be served outside. Dad took the day off work to help with the pouring of the cement, and my sisters and I were to help hold the footings in place. The cement truck arrived, backed over the dry sink (a sort of underground holding tank for the kitchen sink waste water) and left a huge gaping hole in the yard. There was no way to get the hole fixed before the tea. Mom may have panicked in private, we’ll never know. She simply set sawhorses around the gaping hole and hung potted geraniums from the sawhorses. Her tea was a smashing success.

Mom is an excellent seamstress and my friends at school always assumed we were very well off financially because of the clothes I wore. Several times a year Mom would drive to a small town in northern Michigan where some sort of designer had a shop. She would purchase end bolts of material and made much of our clothes. I recall a one-of-a-kind winter coat with hand embroidered snowflakes that I refused to give up and wore until the sleeves ended just below my elbow.

There are many aspects of my life that are obviously and radically different from those of my Grandmother and Mother. But I find I can draw strength and comfort from them in many different ways. From my Grandmother I’ve learned to be strong in the face of adversity. From my Mother I’ve learned to be ready for anything and learn to improvise when I need to. From both I’ve learned the importance of family and the great wealth that can be gained from perseverance.

Moral Victory
Often when I was young, and would come home very upset by some travesty (real, or most likely imagined) inflicted upon me by the neighborhood kids, Mom would always say to me “Yours will be the moral victory.” I never “got it” until just a few years ago. This poem speaks to that.

Yours will be the moral victory,

She said when I was small.

Too young to understand it,

The words were tucked away in memories.

Whining all the while,

But why can’t I just punch her

Just once?

I watched as unkind words were spoken

Mean-spirited relatives

Digs and barbs meant only for her

Un-noticed by my father.

Why don’t you say something?

Let her know how you feel

Just Once?

Mine will be the moral victory

She said again to me

Thinking she was a doormat

The words were tucked away in memories

I’m sorry I was mean to you

She said to Mom when dying

I wanted to be just like you

But I never learned how

Mine was the moral victory

Mom said under her breath

Aloud she said

It’s okay, I never really noticed.

I looked at her and smiled

Was this her punch?

Just once.