She is Not Stupid, she is Polish and Has Brains but no Sense
She Could Pass the Tests
Mom was smart, but only in certain ways. I am not writing this for any sort of mean reasons, and do not take me wrong, I am half Polish myself, and I love us.
She was an only child, and in grandpa's eyes she could do no wrong, at least until she turned about 18 yrs. old. He called her his little princess, and well into her 60's she treated everyone around her like she was royalty. She was difficult, stubborn, and would go a long country mile to help you solve a problem, even if she really only needed to go a short city block to fix it.
She studied and received certification in each and every one of the following fields, yet she lost interest in them as soon as she achieved her certification . These are listed, not in any particular order, but just as I can remember them growing up. It reads like this......
- Nurse
- real estate
- journalism-wrote her own column for local paper for 3 months and quit
- sales
- testing hearing impaired patients
- cardiac care nurse
- missionary
- cook
- restaurant management
- bookkeeper
- teachers assistant
- tutor
- electronic assembler for circuit boards
- teaching special needs children
- nanny
Do You Smell Something?
We had a camper several more years down the road, and by this time I was about 12 or 13 yrs. old.
We had just come home from a very long road trip, and we had been looking for an item for a day or two. Suddenly it hit us, it was in the camper. Mom and I went out to the driveway, and I popped the door open and stepped in, and she came in right behind me. We had no light, but the smell of propane was thick in the air.
In the pitch black of night, I said, "mom, I smell gas, don't light a ......" and with that I heard the distincive sound of a match on a striker.
The rest of the story is evident, and self explainitory and the best way to say what happened next can be done in one word......booooooom.
A Couple of Situations that are Better than Explaining
I was about 7 or 8 years old, and my grandparents had bought me a boat that was meant for the bathtub, and it had a turnkey on top to make the propeller spin and the boat move through the water. Unfortunately, water got into the boat through the top, and once inside would cause a bit of rust to stain the tub where ever it was set down.
After cleaning the tub, she got upset with my boat, and announced that she was going to fix it. Upon inquiry I found out that she really did intend to fix the boat, for she "had an idea".
I followed her into the garage, and she went into the toolbox and took out a nail and hammer. She turned the boat over and placed the nail and I knew what the next step was going to be. I began to cry.
"What are you crying about, I am not going to throw the boat out, you can keep it, I am just fixing it so that the water will drain out." she explained to me very patiently.
"No, you are breaking my boat," I insisted.
She began to grow impatient with my lack of understanding, and said in a very straightforward and knowing tone, "Just watch and learn, I am only going to fix it so that we don't have to throw it away."
So I quieted down and just watched sadly but with a tiny bit of hope, as she put a large nail hole right into the bottom of my boat. She turned it over and the water drained out. "See, I told you I was just fixing it so the water could drain."
I told her to go and see if it still floated. I went another direction for I could not watch the results of her fix job. The boat disappeared and not another word was ever mentioned about it again.
no matter what, she was and still is right
She taught me how to survive in a family of no girls, only myself and 7 brothers. She taught all of us to be self sufficient, independent, and how to take care of those we love, although there were times that one or the other of us wondered if she wasn't really trying to kill us.
What she lacked in common sense she made up for with an extra huge dose of self assuredness. No matter what the situation, she was positive she was correct. It was more than just self esteem, she was correct even when everyone knew she wasn't. She taught us all how to be hard workers, how to tackle and complete a job, and of course how to study.
We all did survive her through our childhood years. She is now 77 yrs old, and to this day I do not think I can think of one time when she was not correct in what she thought and believed. This could be considered an attribute, but to those of us who lived with her, it was a possible ticket to a short life. We learned to be diplomatically cautious.
