Author Archives: Lynn Osborne

What do you do when your kids do something really bad?  

Forget  showing disappointment, go straight to guilt.  

Here’s how it’s done:

First, look the perpetrator straight in the eyes – with tears in yours – and  ask , “How could you do such a thing after all I’ve done for you?”

Then, follow it with, “Promise you’ll never do this again, and if you lie, God will know.” 

This one-two punch instills instant guilt plus a healthy dose of fear.  It kept us on the right track.  And if you start when your kids are young, all the better.

Once Mom was done calling on God to pick up where she was about to leave off, that was it.  No lectures, no time outs, no taking anything away.  She was done and on to something new. Helicopter moms weren’t invented back then, and even if they were, trust me, she would never have been one.

Why not?

Because she had better things to do with her time.  And in all honesty, so did we.

Like making things right again with her and the big  man upstairs.

What do you do when your  husband pays more attention to the Red Sox than to you?

You pretend you’re a die-hard Yankees fan.  That’ll  get his attenion.

And in no time at all, you’ll be center stage again.

Mission accomplished.

I am willing to bet $100 (apparently the apple does not fall far from the tree) that she never even watched a Yankee game unless they played the Red Sox. Mom never knew where the Yankees  were in the pennant race or who any of their star players were.

What she did know, however, was that Joltin’ Joe (her beloved Joe DiMaggio) was one of the most handsome men she had ever laid eyes on, and that was enough for her to pledge her undying loyalty to the Yankees.

At least in front of my Dad.

What do you do when you’re winning at an outdoor card game but your stomach really hurts?

You pass gas loudly, laugh, and say “Better to bare the shame than the pain.”  Then you continue with the game as if nothing happened.

OMG.

Apparently everyone thought it was hilarious, but when I heard this story at 10 years old, I was mortified.

Still am. Can you imagine?

All I can say is she must have been winning serious cash that night and couldn’t leave the table.  Even if she was about to explode.

Which, from all accounts, sounds like she did.

What do you do when you get tired of your first name?

You change the pronunciation of it every decade or so.

My mother’s first name was Corrine.  When growing up, her family and friends called her CorEEN.  When we moved to California in the 80s, she changed the pronunciation to CorIN for the first ten years and then to CorEY for the next ten.  When Mom moved back East, she became CorEEN again.

Confused?  Join the club.  But the best part is yet to come.

At her funeral last year, the priest who presided over the service shocked us all when he called her CorRYNE.

Was this some kind of cosmic joke?

At the time, my sister and I were furious.  But after ten minutes of listening to the priest’s stories about dear old CorRYNE,  we laughed.  Mom’s name was due for a change anyway.

If there’s one thing our mother was, it was predictable.  Even from the great beyond.

What do you do when a singer on TV hits a bad note?

Put your hands over your ears and yell, “Oh dear God, she’s so flat!”

This was a daily occurence in our house. An unsuspecting visitor might have thought Mom was commenting on someone’s bosom, but we knew she was lamenting about a pitchy singer. Remember, my mother was a soprano with perfect pitch.  Listening to off-key singing was a form of torture for her.

Several years back when Mom was in the Alzheimer’s unit, my daughter, Allie, and I went to visit.  Mom was drifting in and out of sleep, and all the nurses suggested I sing an old Sinatra song to fully awaken her.  Inspired, I belted out “Fly Me to the Moon” for her (and everyone else) to hear.

Her response was not exactly what I was going for:  Mom puckered her face as if she just tasted a horribly sour lemon.

Those nurses totally set me up.

Shocked and a bit hurt, I handed the solo over to Allie. Within 10 seconds, Mom breathed a heavy sigh of relief, broke into a beautiful smile and opened her eyes to see a sweet 12-year old singing one her favorite songs – in perfect pitch.

Even though the connections in her brain were completely malfunctioning, her musical ear was as sharp as ever.  We all had a good laugh at the faces she made, including Mom, who was still cognizant enough to enjoy the joke.

At the expense of yours truly, of course.

What do you do when you suspect your husband is falling for someone else?

Invite her over for Sunday dinner.

Awkward?  Yes.  Genius?  Who knows.  Maybe this was Mom’s way of keeping friends close and enemies closer.

At the time, I was a teenager and thought my mother was completely clueless.  Now I know different.  She was totally aware of the threat, and her seemingly innocent invitation was a brilliant move to show her competition the family and home she and my father had built – together.

That infamous Sunday lunch marked the first and last time any of us saw my dad’s pretty friend. But I never forgot her.

Neither did he.

What do you do when your beloved father dies on the day your daughter gets engaged to be married?  

You put her happiness first and keep the sad news to yourself until the next day. This she did for me, and I will never forget it.

Years later when she was well into her dementia and receiving excellent care at a Masonic nursing home, I thought about what I would say at her funeral. Would I be able to remember any of the good after the nightmare we had been through for five years?

At first, the answer was no.

Then, I dug deep and remembered this story.  Then another and another.  Pretty soon I had ten wonderful stories and realized how good she was to me when it really counted.

Mother of the Year?  Not really.

Mother of the Year on the day I got engaged? Absolutely.

What do you do when the next-door neighbor reaches down and cops a feel in broad daylight?

Whack him upside the head.  She took him out with one punch, and I had a ringside seat for the whole show.

We all knew our neighbor was a creeper but for some reason, Mom didn’t see it.  Until, one summer afternoon, he put his arm around her shoulder, reached down, and squeezed one of the girls.  Then all hell broke loose. 

The creeper found out the hard way that Mom didn’t go for that sort of thing.

She didn’t tell my Dad, and I didn’t say a word, as  I knew she was embarassed.

But she grew a foot taller in my eyes, and how I wish I told her that.

What do you do when you have perfect pitch but your kids can barely carry a tune?  

You sing all the time and encourage them to do the same.   And never, EVER criticize.  This rule only applies to children.  Adults, singing-show contestants over 18, and professional singers are fair game. 

Music was my mother’s true love.  Way before she was married, Mom sang in an orchestra with her best friend, and she loved it.  She would also  sing with her sisters, who  were gifted songwriters.  In the late 50s, they all auditioned for the Ted Mack Amateur Hour (the prelude to American Idol) and were heartbroken when they were not selected.

Mom sang her sisters’ songs all the time.  In fact, she sang these songs so often and so well that we could never tell whether she was singing famous or family songs.  That’s how good they were.

When my mother was in the very late stages of Alzheimer’s and unable to recognize anyone, we racked our brains to say or  do something – ANYTHING – that would spark her memory.  That’s when I sang one of my aunts’ songs to her.

Suddenly, she turned her head towards me, opened her brown eyes and smiled.

I guess some things are just too damn good to forget.