The weekend morning was close to becoming afternoon when I pulled myself out of bed and headed to the kitchen for a cup of coffee.
It seemed as if the entire house came to life. Tink came bopping down the stairs from his office, and the dogs eagerly joined us. As I stirred in the cream, Tink told me that he had a call to the vet about one of our horses who was covered in mud from the creek, his belly swollen, and walking with a mope.
No good news followed that, as we went on to discuss friends and their troubles. One was in serious trouble.
“What do you suppose was the first thing he did?” Tink asked.
“He called his mama,” I replied.
Later, with my cup of coffee, I went onto the back porch while Tink went to the barn before heading to the vet’s house for medicine. For these reasons, it came to mind: all the calls I had made to Mama when I was troubled, sad, or feeling down. A few words from her always made it better, and she never failed to say, “Put it in the Lord’s hands.”
I pondered the handful of letters I have in a fireproof safe. Mama wrote them to me when I lived in a foreign land, 500 miles north of the beautiful rural South where I grew up. It was the best life training I ever had. I was forced to learn to drive in snow that lingered all winter and to deal with a boss whose words were often unkind and profane.
So many times, I picked up the phone and, crying, called Mama. No matter how bad the situation was, she always soothed my spirit.
One time, Mama was in the hospital to get a stent to resolve problems caused by all the Crisco she had consumed. This is a funny aside: my sister and I were with her earlier in the day, before they wheeled her into surgery. Of course, we were terribly worried. After all, Mama had helped to keep Crisco in business for years.
We had been in the waiting room for about 20 minutes. We had a prayer over Mama before they wheeled her away. Suddenly, my sister sat straight up in her chair and exclaimed, “The prayer chain! We forgot to call the prayer chain.”
She grabbed her phone and called the first person on the chain, and quickly, it filtered down as the faithful servants of the Lord began to pray. But… It had been less than five minutes since the chain was activated when the doctor appeared to inform us that the surgery was over and that she had done well.
“Well, I guess our prayer was enough.”
I still laugh about that. In a movie made from one of my books, one of the funniest scenes is when the prayer chain is activated, but the call for prayer is really just to gossip.
Back to Mama and me in the hospital room. After her surgery was completed, I had received news that a publisher had rejected my latest book. I was downcast as I told Mama.
When I finished telling Mama, she said, smiling brightly with a wink of prophecy and holding up a finger, “It only takes one.”
And, so it did. After several rejections, a major publisher paid me a substantial advance and published the book.
Our dear friend Sonya Isaacs, a Grand Ole Opry member along with the three other Isaacs family members, is married to Jimmy Yeary, one of Nashville’s premier songwriters. Jimmy and I both grew up in the most rural way. We now use it to touch a bit of yesterday that lies in everyone’s heart, bringing soothing peace.
Jimmy co-wrote a song that Tim McGraw sang all the way to number one. The title says it all.
“I Called Mama.”
Oh, what I’d give if I could call Mama again.
Ronda Rich is the bestselling author of the Stella Bankwell series. Visit www.rondarich.com to sign up for her free weekly newsletter.