September 4, 1969
Dearest Sister:
It was wonderful of you to call me immediately, and like I told you last night, it will take me a few days or a week for it to really soak in that my little (not after gaining 7 pounds) girl is going to be a mother and that I am going to be a grandmother!
There is absolutely nothing in this world like having your first baby. Nobody in this world could have been happier than I was when George was born. He was so dear to me.
The children (William and Charles) seem quite blasé about the whole thing, but I am so excited. It will be wonderful having another member in the family, it seems to be dwindling so…
Much love,
Mamma
There we were, Reg and I, expecting our first baby, of course not knowing then we would have Richard Reginald Patterson, III. In April of 1970, we had our first baby, a baby boy, and it was a magnificent occasion. I knew what Mamma meant. But I would never totally comprehend the words that were encased deeply in her grief and remorse. Truthfully, I didn't want to understand or share equanimity of our loss. I held my grief separate from hers, refusing to acknowledge what I had stored in my inner sanctum.
I hate to leave my mother's segment here, but in the following decades, my life was separated from hers and though I frequently visited Thorn Place through the years, my heart never returned to that house. Daddy went up in smoke, so to speak. He died in 1978 from emphysema complications and decades of chain smoking. Mamma remained at the family home until 2005.
This poem encapsulates how my mother lived and loved.
This poem encapsulates how my mother lived and loved.
Poem
By Deane Jones Edmondson
How beautiful if only for a day.
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