Forty-five years ago today, my mother died.

It was 4:24 pm, Thursday, March 24, 1970. Cause of death: metastatic brain tumor; carcinoma of lung. (Recorded like a true genealogist, right?)

I was 16 years old.

Mom never saw me graduate from high school or college, did not attend my wedding, and never met my children—the last of her twenty-two grandchildren.

I never had an adult conversation with her—woman-to-woman—the kind I now have with my own daughters. I didn’t know her well because—well, I was a kid, and in those days, kids just didn’t talk to their parents about topics they sensed were personal.

Mom certainly didn’t have the opportunity in my first 16 years of life to get to know me as a person—my hopes, my fears, my personality—because my “personhood” had not yet fully developed.

She didn’t live long enough to share my successes; soothe me through disappointments; offer me tips on boys, dating, make-up and fashion; or guide me through my teenage years. That was left up to my dad and brothers, who did the best they could under the circumstances.

Forced to drop out of high school during the Depression, Mom never had the opportunity to shed maternal tears of pride when I stepped off a stage with diploma in hand or returned down a church aisle arm-in-arm with my new husband at my side.

She never witnessed any of my personal successes as a professional writer; as a genealogist (most of my research thus far has been on her side of the family); or with my incredible good fortune as the wife of 32 years to Mark Biallas and mother to Meghan and Kelly.

…Which brings me to my mother-in-law, Arlene Eleanor (Boubek) Biallas.

I’ll never forget the day (the night, actually) when I met her in August of 1982. Mark and I had been dating just a few weeks when, on the spur-of-the-moment, he decided to stop by his mom’s house to introduce me to the family. She was 48 years old—just two years older than my oldest sister—and I was 29.

She was adorned that night in a pink snap front housecoat and rollers in her golden blonde hair. Immediately after greeting me, she began dashing about their modest living room, dusting off end tables, straightening up magazines and adjusting slipcovers on the chairs to make the place “presentable” to her son’s new girlfriend.

I was completely smitten—with HER. With a woman—a mom—so young and attractive and energetic, even if she was depicting the 50s era housewife she truly was, making sure the place was spotless for her eventual daughter-in-law.

I had 16 years with my own mother—much of it as a young child. But I’ve had more than twice as long—over 32 years—with Arlene, better known now in the family as “Gam.” (It’s a name she was christened with by her firstborn grandchild, because Meghan just  couldn’t quite pronounce the word “Grandma” yet.)

Thirty-two years to get to know and love a new mom, sister, and eventually, friend. A woman who—though she never guided me through boys, dating, make-up and fashion—did get me through the early years of marriage, home ownership and child rearing. A woman who (carefully) offered tips on cooking, homemaking, and household purchases when she saw I struggled with them—a role she was well prepared for in 1952 as President of the Home Ec Club at Oak Park-River Forest High School.

“Did you know, Patti, that when you want to rinse egg yolk off a plate you should use cold water, not hot, because the hot water will just smear it more?” (I told you her tips were gentle.)

She was the Mother of the Groom but I, too, quickly claimed her as the Mother of the Bride, as well.

What fun we both had in those early days as she helped me pick out china, attend dress fittings, and fill out seating charts for a wedding reception. The greatest gift she ever gave me (after that of her son, of course) was given the day she sat on the back steps of Kiki’s Bridal Boutique located in an old Victorian home in Algonquin, Illinois, after my last dress fitting.

She took a final drag on her last Winston, and vowed to stop smoking cold turkey so she’d “be around for her kids and her future grandkids.”

She was 49 years old at the time and had been smoking for 30 years. She did stop smoking, too—just as she had promised—and three weeks ago, Gam celebrated her 81st birthday.

After my wedding in 1983, her role for me progressed from Mother of the Bride, to Mother of the Newlywed, to Mother of the New Homeowner, and—eventually—to Mother of the soon-to-be New Mom.

Her eyes lit up as she purchased baby clothes, planned baby showers and christenings, and helped me hang curtains in the baby’s room. And when those bundles of baby bliss arrived, she took great pride in “demonstrating” how to bathe my babies—and I let her—even when I’d already mastered that skill.

As my girls navigated the years as toddlers, pre-schoolers, and early grade schoolers, she never missed an event: first day, last day, grandparents day—whatever.

She was there for them all—every birthday, ballet recital, and softball game. She even scored a home run for the parents’ side when an end-of-season game pitted the Purple Parrots against the parents in a “just-for-fun” season finale followed up by a pizza party at Papa Passero’s.

And every 31^st of October—without fail—for 12 years straight,  she came to our house for Halloween, walking the neighborhood with her costume-clad granddaughters as they begged for goodies throughout the neighborhood.

When they all got home and the loot was reviewed, the girls generously (and very ceremoniously) offered their Baby Ruths—Gam’s favorite candy bar—to their one and only grandma as payment for her loyalty on this apex of children’s holidays.

And, of course, Gam always bought the kids’ Girl Scout cookies—far too many boxes than she could ever consume, which could be found deep in her freezer for months thereafter.

And NO grandmother—none, I tell you—could have possibly been prouder to attend her two granddaughters’ college graduations a few years ago from Butler University, in Indianapolis, Indiana, and Ripon College, in Ripon, Wisconsin.

Gam’s most treasured memory of all with her granddaughters though, she’s often proclaimed, is of our trip to Disneyworld when the kids were 8 and 9 years old. “That was the greatest moment of my life!” she’s exclaimed more than once. (But then Gam always speaks in superlatives until the next “greatest” or “most beautiful” event in her life comes along.)

As the girls got older and were in school all day, Gam and I took that opportunity, without kids underfoot, to go on our own mother-daughter field trips–going shopping, out to lunch, or to check out the latest offerings at the local used bookstore. Eventually, our connection as mutual moms morphed into a full blooded friendship.

We traded paperbacks—even a few racy ones. She got me hooked on LaVyrle Spencer (a romance writer). I got her hooked on Patricia Cornwell (murder and suspense). She offered suggestions on home decorating. I edited her resume, which enabled her to nail her last job—a job she secured at 66 years of age and retained for 14 years until the age of 80 when she was diagnosed last fall with ALS.

Also known as “Lou Gehrig’s disease,” ALS is a neuromuscular disease quite rare in 80 year olds, and it’s progressed very rapidly in Gam.

In January, she was forced to move out of her home of 50 years and now resides in a skilled nursing facility where she’s attended to by nursing staff around-the-clock. Today she’s completely paralyzed and is weeks (if not days) away from totally losing her voice. Marie, her hospice nurse, tells us that soon her breathing will be compromised, and she’ll most likely need to be sedated to make her as comfortable as possible as she passes from this life to the next.

When I visited with Gam last Sunday night, she whispered haltingly but directly, of her impending death: worrying and wondering what lies ahead. We talked of heaven and her predecessors who have gone there before her: her beloved parents, Eleanor and Charlie;  her grandparents; and even my parents, too.

I asked her to look them up when she arrives—Gerry and Dorothy Desmond who died 36 and 45 years ago in 1979 and 1970. I asked her to introduce herself to them, and to fill them in on all she’s enjoyed on their behalf with their mutual granddaughters during her time here on earth.

She promised to do just that and I know that she will—after all, 33 years ago she vowed to stop smoking so she could be there for her kids and her future grandkids, and she certainly followed through on that promise.

It’s an odd place I find myself in right now as I reconcile being a professional genealogist who, in a detached way, notes birth, marriage and death dates of  ancestors, with losing a woman I know and love who’s on the threshold of her final days—a woman who’s been a surrogate mom—no, a real mom—to me, for the past 32 years.

The day will soon come though, when I’ll have to add the final date for her name to the Biallas family chart.

But clearly, family trumps genealogical recordkeeping in this case, for Arlene—Gam—will forever be more than just another name and a few dates on my family tree.

Peace be with you, Mom.

…and Godspeed.

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  Copyright © 2015 Patricia Desmond Biallas

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Note to my readers:

This is my first post since November of last year when Arlene was diagnosed with ALS. Personal demands related to her care and comfort forced me to take an unplanned sabbatical. Only now, have I had the opportunity to get back to my genealogical research and writing. Thank you to all of my readers for staying with me on yet another phase of my own personal GeneaJourney.

PDB