My mother’s voice was smooth and modulated, but not quite Southern in the way that one might think of as a classic Southern lilt—no real gliding diphthongs or vowel breaking or even a drawl of any significance. Then again, her first language was French and in her peculiar way considered a strong regional accent a sign of ignorance.
Her mother was the daughter of one of the seven sons who founded this area where I was born and raised. She—my maternal grandmother—was born into a time when chaperones on honeymoons were expected and women were forever known as “Mrs.” after marriage. When business affairs, bank accounts, control over separate marital property, and even freedom of travel were restricted for women. She divorced my grandfather after some 50 years of marriage (though they had long-before set up separate households) once laws had evolved enough to damper the harshness of legal property division. I remember little about her and even less about her voice, which is now just an echo of level, but honey-harsh, remonstrations demanding I and my dirty feet stay on her porch glider while my father was allowed to enter her house to pay rent. Hers was a voice you did not want to hear.
My mother inherited that distinctive way of being heard above the cultural noise drowning out women’s voices. Her’s was also a quite voice, all the more menacing when it moved slightly down in register and rose from deeper in the diaphragm. When someone would remark that my mother “never yelled,” my response (whether or not spoken) was, “she doesn’t need to.” She was also a stickler for proper English and thought nothing of correcting a speaker—any speaker—when “I” was used as an object in a sentence, when the verb tense on a collective noun was missed, or a slip of any number of mistakes made during almost any casual conversation. Her voice often carried conviction with a hint of menace, like the old itinerant preachers who delivered tented sermons of redemption and damnation on sultry Southern nights just the other side of the railroad tracks demarcating the white section of town.
Her voice was also the voice you would most want to hear when ill or in need; it carried with it a deep understanding of frailty and disappointment and even loss. Despite its ability to comfort, her voice always possessed a timbre of equal amounts reproachment and rapprochement; and while it rarely (if ever) lied, it sometimes tempered the truth based on a very basic understanding of the power of words and the potential cruelty of speech. It was filled too—in a way that only a southern whisper honed by generational disdain and an unwarranted sense of superiority—an innate bigotry and prejudice toward entire classes of people. Hers was a voice of reason, at times of insanity, occasionally humorous and loving, often demanding, sometimes irreverent, but never ignored.
On mornings such as this—when the sky is clear and the chilled air feels thin and brittle—I can almost hear her patient admonishments and sibilant shushes toward words I haven’t yet spoken. Hers was a voice of economy and richness that I came to appreciate only too late in life. But it is a voice, despite its history, that gave me a taste of the infinite variety of language and instilled an appreciation for clarity and honesty. Her’s is the voice that carries in these quite winter mornings when I have the patience to listen.
(February, 2024)
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My hope for the day is that each of you celebrates life in one way or another and finds peace in these turbulent times. Be well, be kind, and appreciate the love you have in your life.
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Grab your coffee or tea and join us, please.
What's on your mind this morning?