I’ve been struggling all week to know what to say about my mom. It’s going to be hard for me to say anything, so I know you’ll bear with me.
My mom was born Mary Jane Hammill on September 14, 1942, in Lincolnville, Maine. Obviously that means her birthday is this week. I think she would want us to celebrate rather than mourn and in that spirit I brought a cake that she would like. I also brought some of her jewelry so anyone who would like a keepsake of her can take something home. Anyone who knew my mom knows she loved to show off her sparkly and colorful things. She also was generous to the bone and loved to share. So I think all of this will please her.
So, back to Lincolnville. My mom was raised by her mother, Hester Calderwood Hammill, largely as a single mother and with a great deal of struggle. My grandma worked hard scrabble in whatever way she could, often cleaning summer estates and other upper-class homes around the Camden area. They lived a very stoic and simple life but largely my mom had blissfully happy memories of her childhood. For a large period of time the two of them lived in a little cabin built from a modified hotdog stand someone gave them. It was situated on a steep part of the base of Mount Megunticook, only steps from Megunticook Lake. The remnants of that little cabin remain to day and my mom periodically wanted to take a drive to Camden just to drive by it, point it out, and reminisce. Though they moved into Camden Village while mom was still in school, she always thought of that cabin as her childhood home.
Her childhood memories were of simple food and fare. They ate a lot of stewed beans and bread and potato stews. She had tea parties with her cats and toys behind the cabin. She had fond memories of pounding up and down the hillsides on her bike or running up the mountains, which she could apparently do in her youth with great ease. She would fill her tennis shoes with any good berries she found on her adventures and my grandmother would turn them into pies or jams. Though my grandmother was slightly socially outcast as a non-church attending (spiritualist) single mother, my mom sought out faith. She would attend church on her own from a fairly early age, walking to services on her own. Mostly Baptist, but she attended more than one congregation in her quest to find meaning. I should note that mom’s grandmother, mom and aunties were all avid spiritualists. They would often take my young mother with them on drives to Temple Heights spiritualist camp to attend meetings (and have some girl-time, pie, and coffee on the way). My mom’s youthful exposure to a mix of religious and spiritual ideas definitely stayed with her for her lifetime. She was very spiritually open and curious, and a person of great, unshakable faith.
Despite all this youthful fun, life could also be hard and scary. Finding a future for herself was tricky. She studied hard to distinguish herself and was valedictorian of her high school graduation class. The big excitement during high school was that the Oscar nominated film Peyton Place filmed on location in Camden during those years. Mom was already an avid celebrity watcher and had cultivated pen-pal relationships with several celebrities. I brought her scrap book today that includes lots of cast photos and news clips about the film.
The story of Peyton Place revolved around a girl about mom’s age at the time, feeling constrained by small town life and aching to break free into the bright lights and excitement of New York. Mom definitely resonated with that. Like that lead character in the movie, my mom was already writing for the local newspaper and trying hard to find her voice. She was active in debate and theater and other types of extra-curricular groups. She attended at least two Christian writer’s’ conferences during high school and I have letters from her correspondence to my grandma during those. They were her big chance to travel outside Maine and meet academics or professionals who might mentor her. She was successful in that and followed one such mentor to Philadelphia for a while after high school in order to work as a secretary and pursue her writing. She married her first husband during that time, which was not a happy match. Soon she was back in Maine, looking to recover. She always came back home to my grandma during those times in life. The two were as close and she and I have been.
Mary Jane worked for a while after her first marriage at the fish canning factory in Rockland, and when she could afford to she went off to college (Blackburn College) in Illinois. As an older student, already having been married and worked some jobs, she became a bit of a pack leader for her friends. To be more specific, she taught them how to do automatic writing and howl at the moon. She had a lot of fun in college and still managed to achieve well academically.
After another stint at home in Camden, the next foray into the world was to New York City, where she had long wanted to go (probably inspired by the story line of the similar leading lady in Peyton Place). While in New York, living in Brooklyn, she met and married my dad, Lyle Linder. They were both working at McGraw Hill in a department that edited and distributed college textbooks. Before and during my infancy they both worked in the city and traveled around upstate as well as Pennsylvania, distributing textbooks to colleges. While they occasionally rented a place, they spent a lot of time hauling a little camper around behind a battle-scarred Land Rover. My mom went into labor with my during one of those trips. Apparently I wanted to be born in Rochester (like Susan B Anthony), but they had a hospital birth in mind. Mom grit her teeth and sat on the spare tire, so I was forced to disembark the womb in Albany. I’ve harbored the resentment ever since, lol.
Unfortunately their marriage didn’t last, and my mom ended up returning to her home, and her mom, with me. In Rockport she took a job for her attorney’s office working off some of her legal fees from the divorce and ended up staying. A long time. Her career as a legal secretary later became one as a freelance paralegal specializing in real estate title searches. She worked independently for many attorneys and firms over about forty-five years. I’m sure some of you know her best from her professional life. She was meticulous about details in research and had a magical knack for understanding deeds and maps. She was always highly regarded for her skills in title abstracting and worked across Hancock, Washington, Waldo and Penobscot counties at various times.
Those who knew her from work know she was competent, deadline driven, and dedicated. She spent hours in the registries of deeds and sometimes probate, pouring over the books before they turned into computer scans. Sometimes her assistants, which would include and occasional husband and at one time myself, would join her. At the courthouse she was always cheerful and friendly, doing the lunch or coffee runs and encouraging freelancers to eat together on their breaks. She was proud of her loud and eclectic style of dressing, which often included plaids and prints and casually half-matching socks in any given ensemble, and rhinestones added on whenever possible. She always dressed up for Halloween, which everyone came to expect, and, for an extended period in the winter of 2017 proudly marched into work wearing her pink pussy hat.
At home she was an avid gardener (though sometimes the garden planning worked better than the garden itself). She was a kind heart for animals and many strays were brought to her over the years from all corners. She always remained very open and enthusiastic about eclectic spiritual and religious ideas. Despite being open to so much, she always retained a rock-solid faith in God that seemed to remain the mix of Christian Baptist and Spiritualist that she gained as a youth. Despite several hard marriages and many years of economic hardship (often when she was the breadwinner and carrying many people through hard times), she dealt with anxiety and depression, but she was always a rock. She was always ultimately positive and optimistic. She always believed emphatically in good outcomes. In the years after health complications forced her into retirement, she stayed busy at home. She kept planning great gardens that I was largely inept at executing and she helped me to write as well as edit two books. She always had more plans for the future, right up to the end. She was always optimistic and energetic in mind if not in body.
Since she passed, I’ve tried to rely on her advice from the past. My grandmother helped to raise me until she passed away in 1982. A few times in recent years, my mom told me a bit of what it was like to lose her own mother. She told me that despite the other people she had in her life at the time, it was devastating. She felt like she’d lost not only her best friend, but the only person in the world who really loved her for exactly who she really was. And it took a long time for this to fade. When she first started to feel a bit better, it was because she heard a minister read the bit of Psalm 30 that says, weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. Somehow when she heard it that day, she finally had the feeling that she was going to be okay. I can’t say that I’ve had that moment yet, although I’m trying because I know she wouldn’t want me to be sad. I know she wouldn’t want any of us to be sad.
I could talk about her forever, and I will, but for now I’m not sure what else to say, besides to reflect on her legacy. I think she is (can’t say was) the most loving, positive, sweet, generous person that ever lived. I still want her here. I think we need her. But maybe we just all need to be her. I think she’d like that. First, wear plaid with stripes and always mismatched socks. Rock rhinestones on everything. Be the person stray animals get brought to. Make the office lunch run even when you’re busy. Enjoy every holiday, every not-holiday, all the simple things, and basically every moment. Have big ideas. Believe in the basic goodness of life and of others even when bad things happen. Never give up. Never get bitter when it’s hard. Never, never, NEVER lose faith (whatever that means to you). Then…repeat. I love you, mommy.
