Mother & Malapropisms

My mother Jane was super smart.  She taught school and worked in the development office of a hospital.  But she had the habit of getting her words wrong, and I used her comments and her charm when writing about Ruth in Hot Flash Holidays and The Hot Flash Club Strikes Again.

Ruth held out her hand. “Let me feel that material. Is it Velvetta?”

“Beauty is only kin deep.”

As it happens, making malapropisms must be genetic, because my sister and I also do it.

My sister often says, “I’m so flustrated.”

Mother was happiest when she was busy. She didn’t want to sit

around like a bump on a frog.

As she got older, she got to do what she loved most: read. She told us she was as happy as a pig on a ship.

I’ve worried that Ruth in my last two Hot Flash Club books will cause readers to think I’m making fun of older people, or people with Alzheimer’s.  I’m not.  My mother always made malapropisms.  If we corrected her, she’d smile and say, “Oh, you.”

When she was living in a retirement home when she was ninety, she told us she was as snug as a bug in a mug.

I have so many stories about my wonderful mother.  Once, when she was driving me to school when I was small, she had the radio set to the classical station, which was playing ballet.  Suddenly, she pointed at the sky.  “Look, Nancy! Those birds seem to be dancing to the music!” She ran into a tree. (We were fine.)

I hope you enjoy meeting Ruth in my books.

And remember, my mother said, “There’s always light at the end of a prayer.”