My dad used to say, “Your Mom is as courageous as a lion.”
I think I realized what that meant when I was about five years old. Of course, at such a young age, you do not have the full understanding of a quote like that. But it often came back to me and I thought about it. My mom always found a solution to our “problems.” She could really make things happen. Growing up, we never realized how she did it. Food was rationed, yet we were not hungry after the war.
Mom sewed and mended all our clothes, and when she needed buttons for them, she would first cut off the buttons from some of her clothes. You could not find buttons in any store just after the war. One time, I was sitting with Mom at the table, and she showed me a new blouse that she had made for me. The buttons were lying in front of her—blue to match the fabric. Sewing the buttons onto the blouse was the last step in finishing it.
I wanted to pick one up. It was so pretty and shiny. Mom kept telling me to leave the buttons on the table, but I could not keep my eyes off of them. I picked one up. Mom looked at me, and I quickly put the button in my mouth and accidentally swallowed it.
It was a large button, and Mom was afraid it would end up in my appendix. She wanted it to come out fast and naturally, so she needed me to eat something special called koek (a little honey cake).
She had no more coupons left for that week, but she went to the little grocery store and explained why she needed koek. The two ladies who owned the store let her buy it without the coupons.
This is just one example of how Mom was always magic.
We moved to Sweden, and again Mom packed our meager belongings. She traveled with three young children—ages two, four, and six—while she was pregnant with her fourth child. When we arrived, we were happy to see Dad waiting for us at the airport in Stockholm. Before we arrived, Mom had done everything alone.
Mom truly was the lion of our family.
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