The Madd House

Hello, my name is Lynda and I’m a Pi Mom. What is a Pi Mom, you ask?   Well, I went from being a full-time Mom to an obsolete Mom in 3.14159265 seconds when my Jerry and her person, Keegan moved to another province ±1,400km away.   I’d like to think I gave her the guidance and courage to spread her wings and fly, I just didn’t realise how successful she’d be and how little she’d need me.   The abruptness sent me reeling. I can remember, while growing up, hearing adults mentioning the words “empty nest”.   There wasn’t much talk about it, no details or advice, but usually it would be said with a sadistic, wry smile or just as a matter of fact, almost as though it was taboo to discuss or speak about it. So when my nest became “empty” it was a swift and painful slap in the chops and, because nobody discusses it, I found myself floundering in deep water without the knowhow of how to swim out.   Nobody warned me about the pain, the loneliness, the guilt and the...

Maybe our grandparents/great-grandparents were onto something. My maternal grandmother was weird.    She would get up at around 4am every morning and zoom into a frenzy fetching coal for her stove, cleaning her house, cooking, baking, feeding the chickens etc.   By 6am you could eat your breakfast off her floor it was so clean. And I thought “Dude, you’re a pensioner.   At least sleep until 7am.” … No, I seriously did NOT think “Dude”.   She would have probably klapped me.   She was known to all as “Ma”.   Just “Ma”.   As to whether it was short for “Ouma”, because essentially she WAS my Ouma or whether it was just that she was quite a strong, stubborn woman and her children called her “Ma”, so everyone called her “Ma”, I will never know. Anyhow, I digress. Farm folk are usually up well before the sparrows to accomplish their many chores and early to bed because (1) it’s dark and there wasn’t – in the old days – much else to do; and (2) we...