Blog Archives

Troublesome Things

5/22/2017

Photo of Charlie Lucas (The Tin Man) and Kathryn Tucker Windham by Elizabeth deRamus

(Unless otherwise noted, the Kathryn Tucker Windham blog is written by her children, Ben Windham and Dilcy Windham Hilley.)

Life is full of troublesome things.

Mother had more than her share of troubles in the course of her long life, but she had a forge-ahead spirit that didn’t allow her to dwell on the dark parts. When I was troubled by life’s little snags, I often called Mother for sage advice. Generally, she had wise words to head me in the right direction, but sometimes she just didn’t have any guidance to give. In those rare circumstances, she would simply pause for a moment and say, “Well, you know, things have a way of working themselves out.”

And it’s true. Rough patches almost always resolve themselves

I asked her one time where her optimism and resilience came from. She told me it likely came from her mother, Helen Tucker, who wore her joy on her sleeve. We called my grandmother “Heddie,” likely a child’s first attempts at pronouncing Helen.

When Mother was a little girl, Heddie woke her every morning with this verse:

“This day will bring some lovely thing.
I say it o’er with each new dawn.
Some bright adventurous thing
To hold against my heart
And treasure after it is gone.
And so I rise to greet the day
With wings upon my feet.”

And Mother lived her life by that directive.

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Mother’s Day

5/10/2017

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(Unless otherwise noted, the Kathryn Tucker Windham blog is written by her children, Ben Windham and Dilcy Windham Hilley.)

Mother’s Day is nearly upon us. It’s a sweet occasion and important to many mamas who look forward to that special time.

While my mother was in this world, we never celebrated Mother’s Day. She thought it was an insult to allot a measly 24 hours to recognize the person who does a yeoman’s job year-round. Just an insult!

But because she was widely loved, people often sent her Mother’s Day greetings and little gifts. Mother, of course, appreciated all the gestures of affection but often had little use for the gifts she received. The presents usually wound up in the top of the hall closet along with an assortment of gift bags and bows that were “perfectly good for reusing.”

One Mother’s Day, I asked my mother if she had any guilt about storing away the things that the well-intended sent her. Instead of answering me, she went to her room and returned with her Bible. She thumbed through it and pulled from the worn pages a yellowed clipping. It was a poem by Jane Merchant called “The Gift.” It read:

   Whatever gift I give to you is yours.
   Give it away, or keep it, as you will.
   The special books, the china miniatures,
   The little birds carved with beguiling skill

   I shall not peer about your house to see
   If they are dusted well and duly shown
   To visitors, as treasured things may be.
   I made a gift of them, and not a loan.

   I know that gifts sincerely loved
   Both for themselves and for the giver’s sake
   Have in life’s many changes often proved
   A burden; be relieved of the mistake
   Of thinking you must keep a gift I give
   (Except my love) as long as you shall live.

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What God Asks

5/1/2017

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Photo: Ted Tucker

(Unless otherwise noted, the Kathryn Tucker Windham blog is written by her children, Ben Windham and Dilcy Windham Hilley.)

As Mother entered her nineties, she sometimes was asked about dying.

Mother had no fear of dying. She called it “the next great adventure.” What she could not tolerate were all the euphemisms people used for death.

“Why in the world would someone say they ‘lost’ somebody?” Mother would ask. “Why, that would just be careless! Why can’t people just say someone died?”

She had other notions about death and dying. Speaking at a friend’s funeral, Mother said she believed that, when you die and you get your hearing before God, he doesn’t ask if you obeyed the commandments. He doesn’t ask if you led an exemplary life. He simply asks, “Did you have a good time?”

What a marvelous way of looking at life and death.

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Photo Courtesy of Ted Tucker

"Some people are important to intellectuals, journalists, or politicians, but Kathryn Tucker Windham is probably the only person I know in Alabama who is important to everybody."

–Wayne Flynt, Professor Emeritus in the Department of History at Auburn University.