Mom

Note to readers: Posting from me has been very erratic, if not nearly absent, the last couple months. I think you’ll understand why, with this post. I look forward to getting back to regular posting and podcasting soon. - Kevin

---

I’ve been writing opinion pieces in some fashion for over thirty years. Sharing thoughts, speaking publicly, and writing is something that has always come pretty easy to me. I say all that to say, I’ve really struggled getting this particular post out. The words have not come easily at all. I’ve put this off and put this off. Perhaps it’s the finality of the situation, but I’ve just been really reluctant to write out my thoughts.

My brother, who’s a far better writer than me (and you should check out his work), said recently about all this, “I didn’t just love my parents, I *liked* my parents.” I couldn’t agree more, and I think that’s why that’s why writing this has been difficult.

Marilyn Robin Klinkenberg was born on May 5, 1936, and passed away on February 4, 2024. She was born to Bernard Robin and Bernice Jankowski Robin. Her father, a Syracuse, New York native, worked in the grocery and deli business and made the best corned beef in the world (according to Mom). Her mother was born in Natalia, Poland, and emigrated to America as a young girl.

Mom and Dad, who I wrote about here, had a made-for-tv love story. Mom had a childhood pen pal, back when people still did those sorts of things, who was the daughter of one of her Mother’s friends from Poland. The friend ended up in Leavenworth, Kansas, and of course, my Mom was in Syracuse. In the 1940s and 50s, that was no small distance. While Mom had a very difficult and turbulent childhood, she managed to persevere and visited her pen-pal on a trip to Kansas in 1956. On that trip, she met my Dad, who had grown up in nearby Basehor. Leavenworth was the “big town” where a lot of kids went to hang out and meet other young people. My Dad and his siblings were no exception.

Soon after, Mom and Dad started their own relationship by mail. After a couple more in-person visits, they were married on Christmas Eve, 1957. Ultimately, they had four kids, spent two years in Germany while Dad was with the Army, and then spent most of their working years moving all over the Midwest with Wilson Foods Corporation. During a lot of that time, Mom worked as a secretary in schools, but also was intensely focused on making sure her kids got the best education they could get, and took school seriously. Mom could be really tough, and very frank with her words. But she also was very quick to share her love with all of us.

I think most of us know how painful harsh words can be from a parent, but also how much love you can feel when kind words are shared. My parents were adept at both. I’m mindful of this myself, now that I have my own small children that we are trying to prepare for the world. It’s a tough thing to balance – knowing when to be firm, even harsh; but at the same time, making sure your kids know they have your unconditional love. Hopefully, I can apply the lessons I learned from Mom and Dad.

Of all of the four of us kids, I probably got the most time with Mom as a child, and probably more of her good side. That’s what comes with being the youngest. My brother is six years older than me, and my sisters ten and eleven years older. My siblings, who used to love to torture the youngest kid, still famously use my Mom’s words in my defense, “he’s a good kid, leave him alone.” So yeah, I know I was more coddled than the rest of them, and had a lot of things easier. I also was a very sickly kid with terrible childhood asthma, and I know that made Mom much more protective of me. She later told me she didn’t sleep a full night until I was about twelve years old, and had finally gotten past the worst of the asthma.

We all learn things, good and bad, from our parents. Hopefully, if we’re lucky, it’s more good than bad. I’ve talked before about what I got (and still get) from My Dad. Mom taught me so many things, it’s impossible to capture them all in one essay. A few things do stick out, at least at the moment, and for me it’s worth sharing these with others.

Mom, I think, taught me to be kind with people, before anything else. I think she knew how hard life can be on people, and other kids, and really emphasized kindness and positive attitudes. She told me to be kind to people, even when others weren’t. She felt that approach paid off in the long run.

I like to think she had the philosophy espoused by Dalton from “Roadhouse,” long before it became popularized in the classic movie.

In most cases, I think Mom was right. I’ll admit, it’s not always easy, the world is full of plenty of lousy people. Some days, some weeks, are much harder than others. I have plenty of moments of not being that person. But, I have always strived to embody that spirit.

She also really taught me to be persistent, and to keep trying at whatever I was doing. When I wanted to learn the violin as a kid, she insisted I would practice every night. God, that must have been so painful for her to hear. Beginning violinists are brutal! But I did persist, got pretty darn good, and even got a partial scholarship for it for college. She had a similar attitude when it came to our schooling, and anything we took up.

Mom had such a love of music and the performing arts, that now I wonder how much did she actually nudge me towards the violin? Memory is hazy on that. But through all the years, she adored nothing so much as going to the theater, to a concert, or seeing people sing and dance on tv.

I’ll never forget taking her to a concert before I left KC to move to Savannah. It was obvious she was none-too-pleased I was leaving town. She really wanted to keep her children close to home. So, I took her to the Uptown Theater in KC to see The Swell Season. You may remember them as the musicians who performed in the hit independent movie, “Once.”

This was a sold-out show, and we stood on the floor the whole time in general admission. Mom was no spring chicken – she was around 72 at the time. And, she had no idea who this band really was – it was something I was into. But she stood through the whole thing, and loved it. In fact, the show was incredible. I’ve never seen two performers, largely acoustic, hold an audience of 2,000 people in the palms of their hands with such ease and sincerity. The place was just unbelievably quiet when they spoke and sang ballads. Sometimes there are moments you’ll never forget, and for me, that will always be one. I was so glad to share that with her, and have that memory.

Not The Swell Season - this is Neil Diamond, one of Mom’s favorites

As they grew older, and so did I, my parents never stopped showing their support for whatever I was doing. They came to so many of my silly presentations and activities. I’m not really sure they liked or agreed with much of I spoke about, but they came anyway. They both have just always been there as a foundation for me, in the way you hope your parents will be.

There’s too much to say, so I’ll wrap up by talking about one item that does at least relate to the topic of my site. It always amazed me how much love Mom showed for Kansas City and the Midwest. She wasn’t a native to here. As I noted, she grew up in Syracuse. For so many years, we used to give her a hard time about her New York accent. Gradually the accent faded away, but she still had fondness for Syracuse. Even though her childhood was rough, growing up part of the time in public housing, and living through her parents’ struggles (and ultimately divorce), she still was a New York girl. She left her siblings and all her friends to take on the adventure of being with my Dad. That was a huge sacrifice.

And yet, she really did come to absolutely love this part of the country. As much as anyone in our family, she took all this area had to offer and drank it in. She loved our local sports teams as much as Dad, and often I think she took the losses harder than the rest of us. In fact, in the last conversation we had with her, she asked, “How did the Jayhawks do?” We got to tell her, that night, they won.

It might be my imagination, but it just seems my parents, and much of their generation, had a very firm attachment to place. I suppose some of that is just hardship, and the era. Neither of their families had the luxury to travel, unless they joined one of the military branches. In fact, nearly all the men did do that, but otherwise they weren’t doing the sort of constant travel many of us do today. My Dad did end up in a job that required moving to different places in order to get promoted, but that was rather rare. And the whole time we moved around, they considered Kansas City home.

Today, we seem to treat places as consumer goods. We don’t invest in them in a terribly meaningful way. We seem reluctant to form that kind of attachment. The civic groups that were so common in my parents’ days are mostly defunct or dying out. It’s rare to find CEOs that have a strong attachment to their own community. People in professional and managerial jobs live in a sort of global class that can literally be anywhere.

I’m not saying there’s no benefits to that – it’s very alluring for me as well. I’m part of this world. It’s pretty cool to be able to take your laptop to any interesting spot in the world, and be able to still have a good job. It’s fun to explore all this world has to offer. But, we have to also recognize that there’s a cost or trade-off for everything. How can we have the localism that people seem to desire so much, if we ourselves aren’t willing to invest our time, money and emotions in a physical place?

Perhaps we have some sort of a fear of being too tied down. Perhaps we have made ourselves too busy and life too complex. Perhaps it’s a desire to keep up with the Joneses, and be ready to move on to the next trendy spot on the map. I don’t know. But something I’ve noticed is the attachment to place was just a little different with people of my parents’ generation (essentially, people north of 80 today), than with their children, and their children’s children.

How much more can I say about Mom? She knew how to stretch a nickel like no one else, and did so until the day she died. Old habits and all. She was very social, loved all her various friends, but loved her family more than anything else. The four of us all still feel the benefits to this day.

More than anything, Mom always wanted grandkids. I was very slow to help her out in that regard. While I’m so happy my kids got to know her and spend time with her, it’s a shame they didn’t know her twenty or thirty years ago. Age does take its toll, and the last several years were really rough on her. While I miss her and Dad very much, I’m glad they no longer have to endure the misery and pain that happened near the end.

I’m well aware of my good fortune, for having two remarkable parents, and having them healthy and active for so long. But the end is still the end, and there’s still the realization you have lost people in your life that you talked with and saw regularly. Even when you know it’s coming, and you think you’re prepared, there’s still a suddenness that’s hard to describe. Losing your parents certainly has the impact of making you think more about your own mortality, how you’re spending your time, and what you really want to be doing with it all. It’s a big change, even for a grown man.

For now, I’ll do what I can to honor what they taught me, to focus on my family, and enjoy as much of life as I possibly can. Thanks for reading,