Storytellers

My mother and father were both storytellers. My mother told us her stories at bedtime and on rainy days when she needed to calm us down. We loved her stories. They were always about children out and about in their neighborhood, and the trouble they got into. The main character was a young girl named Naughty Mary, which she changed to Naughty Matilda later, after my older brother married a girl named Mary.

Naughty Mary and her friends got into trouble frequently. She was adept at imagining horrible things for them to do, and they were always found out. My sisters and I were aghast at what they dared to do, and knew the trouble we'd be in if we ever tried to do any of the things they did. Later, when we were too old for the Naughty Mary stories, she told us about her experiences growing up in a small city with two of her sisters. Because she felt responsible for her sisters when they were walking around their neighborhood, she always warned them about people they met who could possibly be a danger to them. I can only guess how she herself knew.

My father's stories were usually about what he did when he was young. No matter what he had done, his descriptions always made us laugh. As we got older he would tell us stories about his family life and the city where he lived. He and his friends owned bikes and would bicycle long distances to go swimming and fishing. On Sundays we would often go for rides and he would drive through the areas where he and our mother grew up, and point out the locations where some of his stories took place.

After I married my husband and we had a daughter, the day came when my mother would take care of her, and tell her and her cousins the naughty Matilda stories. It wasn't long before my husband started asking me about them, and I told him the history of my mother's stories.

A few years later, we were at the Yarmouth Clam Festival where we met an artist, Sherry Fowler, displaying her work. My husband got her card, and later, when I wasn't around, he called her. He told her about my mother's stories and asked her if she could make two dolls, a mother and a daughter. She agreed, and he gave them to me for a Christmas present. I was touched, and extremely pleased with the dolls. Every time I look at them, I think of my mother, and remember the extraordinary woman she was.