 | My mother Frances Dale Locklear was indisputably my life’s inspiration. Her maiden name was Thompson; or so she thought, until her oldest sister Aunt Tie (on her deathbed) revealed to my mom that they did not share the same father. At age 80+, my mom learned that the man she thought was her daddy turned out instead to be her mother's Lumbee postal worker. Even then mama could laugh and say, “What good will tears do?" |
"You Can't Get Blood Out of a Turnip,"
... she would say. Which means you cannot extract something from a source that does not possess or have the desired thing to give. So, we doodled. Mama used doodling to teach me how to analyze and create spontaneously. Mama was a clever planter, too from planting seed in the ground to planting passions in me. Grasping her patience and discernment also taught me when to speak and keep my mouth shut.
"Ta Da"
What a storyteller! My favorite was about a white boy named Little Johnny Corn-Corn, who was lost in the forest and discovered by Indigenous People of the Corn. Johnny refused to go home, but instead wanted to live with the Native people. My mama and I made corn dolls and toys from dirt. Being poor, hard work came easy to my mom and us. Playing was easy too. Mama was a magician. One of her favorite magic tricks was squeezing water from a knife. "Ta da."
"Try a Lettuce Leaf First"
On our walks, she showed me things and shared secrets. She would say, “This tree is good for chewing gum. These roots are sweet to eat. These leaves taste like mint.” Once when a bee stung my knee, she calmly spit snuff on my bee bitten leg, immediately reliving the pain. Antiseptics. Poultices. She knew many old ways. On fevered wounds she would first apply a lettuce leaf to assess that pain level, then elevate the relief with other various foods from potatoes to cold bacon.
"Thread This for Me"
As my mom's eyes aged, I threaded her sewing needles. Little did I know that all the time she was sewing, she was sewing the tapestry of what would become my life. I'm my mama's tapestry. Until the day she passed, mama taught me how to live. Her vision for after death was to sew angels' wings.
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