Written by: Eileen Leroux

Mary is a forty year old Social Worker and mother of four children. Her hair of burnish brown, reminds me of aged copper. Have you ever seen a dark purple, almost black pansy? That’s the color of her eyes.

Going back twelve yeas, when I remember her best; I saw her as a courageous and determined individual. She had the courage to face difficulties few people would care to take on, but she did. Willing to do whatever it took to change her life and the future of her children, for the better.

Barely more than a child, she had become divorced and responsible for three children under the are of four. No money, no job and no prospects to look forward to. Mary took the bull by the horns and the first steps to changing her future. She applied for welfare and was able to get an apartment under the section eight program.

During this time, she took advantage of every educational program available to her. She first went to Nassau Community College, a two year college. There they had a "Greenhouse Program" for the children. More than just a day care center with many programs for the education of the children. The children benefitted from her schooling as much as she did. Mary graduated. She continued on to Queens College and graduated. Then finally went to Adelphi University, also in Nassau County, Long Island. In each of these facilities she was able to get day care for her children. This was provided for students in need of this service. The extra cost was covered by the system and whatever she could provide herself. Mary studied and the children played with children of other students.

Financing came from student loans and the time invested was seven long years to earn her Masters Degree in Social Work.

A few weeks ago my “wife”, my son and I went to see my mother in Virginia for kind of a pre-holiday get together. The fact that my brother was coming down as well with his son, neither of which we had seen in a couple of years, made it just that more exciting.

The great thing about my “wife” and my relationship is that we don’t have a problem laughing at ourselves when we do something stupid, which we do often. So we laughed it off when we ignored my mother’s directions and turned a two hour trip into a five hour trip, choosing instead to lose ourselves in conversation and enjoy the silence that the long nap the car provided our son.

Arriving was no big surprise; my mother telling me how much she missed me and liked my new beard, my mother hugging my “wife” with an uncomfortable grip, my mother stealing our son and shoving new toys at him, my stepfather smiling, my brother holding onto some cute new girl he is dating, his son trying to hit everyone, my “wife” and I questioning our decision to come down in the first place. The evening started out well enough with wine and dinner and everyone sitting around updating each other on important and not so important events in their life while a football game that we were all trying (but not succeeding) to ignore went on in the background.