Mum Turns 80 Today

Mum turns eighty today.

How did that happen? I mean, I remember her fiftieth! And now I’m 57 myself.

I remember her sixtieth too when my wife Jill organised a surprise party for her. Deeply emotional time.

And then her seventieth.  Here’s the photo from that occasion. I met mum in a nice part of town that day (I’d been at a running injury recovery centre nearby).  We bought mum a coffee machine. It still looks pristine (although used everyday for ten years).

Mum ten years ago on her 70th birthday

Fortunately, she does too. Despite being eighty Mum’s brain is sharp, even as her body lets her down. Or more to the point, even as she goes the way of all flesh. It’s important to take a theological lens to these things.

As mum has done for everything. The thing I most appreciate about Mum is how young she has stayed in terms of her enthusiasm for the things of Jesus.  She doesn’t sleep well, so she often spends her time listening to sermons overnight. She reads. She prays. She gives generously. She serves the people around her joyfully.

When she moved into her independent living unit in the aged care facility she remarked on all of the “old people” there. Hey mum, you’re there yourself!

Mum still teaches Sunday School at her church. At eighty! The kids love her. Perhaps because there’s something of the child-like wonder still in Mum.

It’s as if part of her reached the age of eight and went, “I’ll stop off right here.”

Which in a sense she did.  Mum’s greatest memories are of her childhood growing up in Dublin.

Part of the child-like aspect of mum is down to her being removed from her foster family – the family who loved her so much – at the age of eight. And something about Mum just hangs around that time in her life.

I’ve written about that in the past. Stolen from a loving foster family in Dublin and taken back to a strict family in Belfast. Mum’s nightmare would have been a psychologist’s dream. Though she’s never been to a psychologist.

Mum’s wistful longing reminds me of the poem by Patrick Kavanaugh: If You Ever Go To Dublin Town, which says:

On Pembroke Road look out for me ghost,

Dishevelled with shoes untied,

Playing through the railings with little children

Whose children have long since died.

Mum is still that child in some senses, even though she’s mature in godliness.  Which probably means when it comes to evil, she is an infant, as the Scripture calls us to be.

Eight to eighty has been a journey for mum. A journey that has at times been painful.  In fact there’s some symmetry to the figures. Something biblical yeah?

Mum was married the day after her 21st birthday.  Then my dad left her when she had just turned forty.  Now she is eighty.  One quarter of her life before marriage, one quarter of her life married, and now half of her life by herself.

Forty years. It’s biblical indeed.

And for Mum it is all a bit biblical in terms of her longings. That longing for a home not built by hands. That wandering as a pilgrim in a foreign land.  I like the manner in which Mum has not been content to have this age bring her the true things of comfort.

I’ve watched as she’s battled through forty years – though not all years were battles and there were many joyous moments – without my Dad.  And then I’ve watched as she prayed for him (and for us) with motherly persistence.

We went out on Mum’s birthday last year. 79.  Her eightieth year began. Where did those 365 days go?  And I posted something then too on my socials:

Mum, a full 365 days ago

The ten years has aged her. But not too much. A common factor in the two photos is cake. Cake and chocolate.  Mum’s two (albeit minor) vices.

Of course Mum’s eightieth is a reminder of my own mortality.  That I can remember very clearly the day that Mum turned fifty – and how seemingly short a period in between then and now – tells me how quickly my own life will go by. Teach us to number our days, indeed!

We won’t be with Mum today. Jill and I along with Declan have moved to Sydney. And it seems an awkward time to do that. We have Mum, and we have Jill’s beloved Mum and Dad too, all aging and all living in Perth.

For us that move was somewhat biblical too. I’ve written about how my friend told me – when I said I was a bit scared to move – “Go scared!”

Perhaps that’s the point. No, I am sure it is, when God is with us.

Of course Mum won’t reach 120. Moses was just starting out on the work that God had called him to do when he was the age that Mum is now. Pretty sure the only tablets Mum is carrying around have to do with arthritis and heart murmurs.

But in a sense that’s right. Because the word of God has been written on a tablet of flesh in Mum’s life since she was saved (remember that word we used to use about something deciding to trust in Jesus?) back in her teens. She’s crossed a few Red Seas, and a few River Jordans in those decades since.

I’m pretty sure Mum will continue walking as a pilgrim for the rest of her days, whether she makes it to ninety or not. And I’m sure she’ll keep praying for her kids and her grandkids and her great-grandkids and her church and her pastor, and those missionaries on the fridge.

Tomorrow I’m speaking at a school to three cohorts of students on the topic of “Why I Am Still A Christian”.  Telling the story of how I became a Christian is easy: aged eight, kneeling at bedside confessing sin and trusting Christ.  It’s the nearly fifty years since that have been the challenge. Getting up each day and doing that again. Just as Mum has done.

So mum has reached eighty. And while many things have changed, some things haven’t. Including Mum’s commitment to keep following Jesus (along with me celebrating her birthday alongside a running injury).

I’ll have to WhatsApp Mum later today to get a screenshot of her on her big milestone birthday and keep the tradition going.