The Best Mother-in-law I Ever Had

Today is mother-in-law day. I didn’t even know there was a mother-in-law day until the TV told me this morning. The news commentator said that over 50% of people asked said they had a good relationship with their mother-in-law. I could be included in this statistic. I had a good mother-in-law.

Mary Dow was not a perfect mother-in-law. She meddled in our business at times. She could be a little picky about things that I didn’t think were very important. She spoiled my kids when we went to visit. Even so, she was a good mother-in-law who I also considered a friend.

We weren’t immediate good friends. It took a while. We built our relationship slowly but solidly. At first, when we’d visit their house or they’d visit ours, I was self-conscious of everything I did. Not because she was judgmental but because I respected her and knew that she had much more experience in everything than I did. I wanted her to like me. I wanted her approval.

I think the turning point in our relationship, the point that she and I were no longer just 2 women that loved the same man, came when she was in the hospital for a hip replacement (or was it knee). She needed me during that visit. She needed me to donate blood to her. She needed me to sit by her side while my father-in-law experienced medical problems of his own. We bonded during that hospital visit. Even though she was going through a lot of physical pain, something good came from it.

Mary had a thing about shoes. She loved them. Me? I’m happy to have a pair of tennis shoes and something nice to wear with a dress. She didn’t understand my lack of concern over footwear. She also grieved over Danny’s concern for his footwear. He wore tennis shoes (sneakers, running shoes, whatever you call them). She thought it just wasn’t right for a preacher to wear such footwear. She frequently told him that and would mail him clippings from catalogs of clothing she thought he should be wearing. He would get annoyed by it all. I was amused. I wonder if we kept any of those clippings. Probably not. Too bad.

Mary was silently concerned about our children. She was more of a traditional type mom. She didn’t buck the system and wondered at us choosing the path less traveled. Her thoughts were that you have your baby in a hospital and send them to school when they’re 5. I was the crazy daughter-in-law that was leading her son astray to do things that seemed highly questionable.

She thought I was crazy when I chose to have my babies at home. She never did understand that decision. She would vocalize her concern but, wisely, she did not make a huge deal out of it. She knew it was our decision to make. She was always relieved when things went well. I don’t think she ever understood that things went so well because they were born at home. She loved my babies and she loved me. She just wanted us to be safe.

She was even more concerned about us home schooling the boys. She just knew that we were going to ruin them. She was more vocal about this. We just kept doing what we thought we needed to and eventually, she was won over to our side. Well, maybe not totally but she respected our decision. I’ll never forget something she said when we visited in their Lufkin home. We were living in Lubbock at the time. Matthew was about 11. He had been home schooled his whole life. In Lubbock, he was in Boy Scouts, Baseball, Tennis, Band and played the piano regularly. She was so proud of him. She commented to me with pride and relief in her voice that he was such a well-rounded all-American boy. She finally understood that we weren’t going to isolate him in our house since we were home schooling. I wish she could see the boys now.

She made one comment to me during the very first year of our marriage that has always stuck in my head. She always had a project going. She loved to crochet. She introduced me to hand smocking. She even sewed some. This was one area that we immediately knew we had something in common. I liked all of this too but I was just in my very early 20s and didn’t know how to do much. Once, when we lived in Conroe and they lived in Houston, she asked me, “What are you working on now?” It was a simple comment that has always come to mind when I don’t have something to do. She went on to say that I should always have a project going. Interesting. I had never thought about it before. Now, I always have a project going.

I could go on and on about Mary but this will have to do for now. As I look back on my mother-in-law, I hope that I can be just as good a mother-in-law to my daughter-in-laws. I hope they will understand that I love them because they love my boys. I hope they will overlook my quirky ways and realize that it’s those quirky ways that helped make their husbands who they are. A good relationship with a mother-in-law is a precious thing and I am thankful that I can say I had a wonderful mother-in-law.