I have no idea why, but for some reason today I’ve had a lot of thoughts about my mom…
My mother was a really special woman.
She was raised in west Texas poverty by farmers. Her parents were not believers, or they never claimed to be anyway, but she accepted Christ at a Vacation Bible School when she was very young.
She had a pretty complicated family dynamic …and because her parents died in a tornado a year before I was born, she never really wanted to talk much about them. She did tell me once that in the aftermath of the tornado, she found a poem about heaven written by her mother. That poem brought her a great deal of comfort and she believed that it pointed to her parents having a relationship with God. She also told me once that her parents used to attend church, but got sideways with the church/preacher because of their judgement over a relative who had a baby out of wedlock.
In middle school, a very young Wille Ann Blackerby saw a picture of my dad in the local paper – and decided that’s who she wanted to marry someday. (Dad was a 4H rockstar!) …and he did look pretty sharp in his tuxedo. They started dating in high school, against the wishes of both sides of the family. Her brother didn’t like my dad because he was a “wimp.” And dad’s parents weren’t crazy about her because (and this is just my best guess) she was from the other side of the tracks.
They dated for seven years, and married only after both had graduated from college. Mom struggled and survived West Texas University, and dad graduated from Texas Tech. Mom always gave dad a hard time about the fact that she had graduated from a “university” and he had only graduated from a college. …and no, it didn’t matter that Tech later became a university. The truth is that mom was not a great student, and barely scraped by in school. For her, it was a miracle that she graduated at all.
While “book smarts” were never her thing, Ann Whitmire excelled at most things she tried. She was a naturally gifted leader. She started teaching when they moved to Wichita Falls. She coached and taught in Archer city – and she had great success coaching girls volleyball. I think she quit because I came along. …and I’m pretty sure she always regretted that decision.
When my sister and I were both old enough for school, Mom went back to work for the YWCA. She loved that job! She ran all the girls leagues for the city – volleyball, softball, basketball …and she championed and helped bring girls soccer to Wichita Falls. I loved her job at the YWCA too …because they had a pool! It was also pretty fun getting to tag along with her on the weekends to check on various games and refs and stuff.
Later in life my mom became a youth minister. Its kind of a funny story. I was in High School and we all attended church together at West Side Baptist. She was always very active in volunteering with youth, then WMU, and eventually Acteens. It was through Acteens that she got to know Hillcrest Baptist. The pastor and his wife and mom were very good friends. One evening, God told her, “I want you to be the Youth Minister at Hillcrest, but not yet. I’ll tell you when.” So mom waited. …and waited. It must have been difficult. Patience never was a strength of hers, and she was best friends already with the pastor and his family. Why wait? …so three years later, the pastor resigned. He’d had a breakdown and left his family. Mom remained best friends with the pastor’s wife, but now there was no affiliation at all with Hillcrest. Thats when God said, “Okay, now.” Mom went to the Baptist Associational office and sat down with the director. It turned out Hillcrest was looking for a youth minister, and she got the job. …the pastor once told me, half joking, “How could I say no to her. Your mom had this really crazy story about God telling her three years ago she was going to get this job. How was I going to say no to that?”
We stayed at West Side – Mom went to Hillcrest. …years later she also served on staff at First Baptist working with Internationals. Missions and evangelism were always her true passions.
When I think of my mom I remember the woman who always wanted me to go to Baylor and become a missionary. She used to try bribery. “If you go to Baylor, I’ll buy you any car you want.” …of course, it was pretty obvious she never could do that… After becoming a pastor, she told me one day that God had finally told her it was “good enough” for me to be a pastor – and not a missionary.
My mom was a trip.
She was a godly woman with an amazing heart. She would give and give and give.
…but she also carried a lot of pain.
My mom had her first “breakdown” when she was at the YWCA. Its my belief that she never learned how to properly deal with stress, and eventually it just overwhelmed her. She was also bi-polar, and wasn’t diagnosed until it was much too late. She was always chasing the next doctor to “fix” her. I was pretty sure she was at the least a hypochondriac – and at the worst crazy. It turns out, she was a bit of both.
I remember getting calls from her late at night in the dorm room at Tech. She would rant about the oddest things…
I lost my mother sometime around then. She didn’t die for years later, but my mom was gone.
One night, Dad and some friends had to commit her. …I don’t blame them at all – or their decision(s). From that point forward though, she was gone.
I miss her.
I’ve often said that Mom gave me two things, and I’ll end my ramblings with those.
1) She instilled in me the fact that I was loved. …and no matter what I ever did, or what I became, or how much I messed up in life, she would always love me.
2) She always encouraged me to listen to/for God. …I’m not sure how she did it, but she raised me with the knowledge that God was always very close by.
…she was also the best prayer warrior that I ever had.
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