Reflections and Recollections of My Mother

My mother, Jean Alison Forbes Holmes, died in the early hours of June 21 after a lengthy decline in her health. She was ninety-four years old. I was unable to attend her funeral in person, due to Covid protocols in the UK, but I was able to share an MP4 video tribute. The text on which I based my presentation is below, and the video may also be viewed here.

Mum, Reflections and Recollections

My mother’s life spanned the greater part of a century—perhaps the most remarkable century in human history as far as innovation and technology was concerned. In 1927, the year of her birth, commercial air travel was almost unknown (that was the year Charles Lindbergh flew solo over the Atlantic ocean), the Model T Ford motor car had only just given way to the Model A, and Joseph Stalin was beginning to take control in Russia. What are my early recollections of Mum?

1. She was a constant presence
2. She was a steady reference point
3. She was an avid communicator
4. She was an energetic producer
5. She was a compassionate giver
6. She was family focused

She was a constant presence

I was born on a farm, and the farm was Mum’s domain. She ran the show. Yes, with Dad’s help over the weekends, but the farm was her operation. So she was always chasing things up (she could be kali!), making things happen, keeping the laborers on their toes to ensure that everything was working as it should. One of my early memories goes like this: there was a shamba, a field, where she had to drive through a gate in our ex-military Jeep. She got out to attend to the gate; I got into the driver’s seat and pressed the accelerator pedal with all my might. She was not pleased by my early instinct to become a motorist. I was just three years old at the time!

She was a steady reference point

That ties in with the first point. Her influence helped me form many of the common-grace values I was to hold to as a child: integrity, honesty, truthfulness, politeness, discipline, and other such qualities. God and the Bible—albeit in a low-key way—were very much a part of her culture and thinking. I lived away from my parents quite a bit as I was growing up. I had two years in a boarding school in the Rift Valley in Kenya, and another four or so years in my teens in Rhodesia living with other friends or family members while I attended day school—a happy alternative to boarding school. But Mum (along with Dad) was a constant reference point. The weekly letters, always updating me on local news, how the dogs and cats were keeping, and what life was like for Dad at work, were always received gladly. And this leads naturally to the next point:

She was an avid communicator

She was always communicating. In the early 1960s, Dad bought her a Baby Hermes typewriter, and she would clatter away on it for hours on end writing and then mailing letters to the four points of the compass. When she upgraded her typewriter, I took over that Hermes and taught myself to type. Later, when computers become commonplace, I helped her set up an email address and she was busy emailing back and forth all through the week just as she had done with her typewriter, notwithstanding failing eyesight.

She was an energetic producer

I have an idea that Mum was very reliant on house servants to do a lot of the mundane work, including cooking and cleaning, but when those colonial days came to an end, she got out some cookbooks and started to catch up all the things she had never learnt. Not only were there the mouth-watering smells that came from the kitchen that made me and the dogs and the cats salivate, but there were other projects going on—knitting during the day while she read a book, sewing and making new clothes, and packaging up gifts and necessities to family members living in other parts of the world. She didn’t make a big deal about these things, but just got on very competently and energetically and did them. It was the same with her garden (she must have had green thumbs)—not just the beautiful flower beds and shrubs that she had, but also the vegetables and fruit she grew—a tribute to her capabilities and diligence in managing the agricultural side of things.

She was a compassionate giver

Mum’s giving came through in many ways. Where she knew of a need that she could meet, she just got on and met it. Her modesty and generosity extended widely in ways like this: she saw some wool she thought would be good for knitting a sweater, so she knitted a sweater and mailed it to me. Or she would press on me (or Sue) some cookies she had made—“Take them; you’ll be hungry later on.” I could provide a lengthy list.

She was family focused

Maybe this draws it all together—she was the constant presence, the steady reference point, the avid communicator, the energetic producer, and the compassionate giver. And in it all, she was family focused. I know she wanted me to speak at her funeral, and if it weren’t for the COVID protocols in place, I would be addressing you in real life, not from a monitor like this. But that’s just the way it has worked out. I plan to visit the UK, God willing, for when we scatter her ashes. I mentioned in one of my points that God and the Bible were very much in her thinking. In recent years, I would often say to her, “Mum, the only hope that we as sinners have before a holy God is that there is a Savior, Jesus Christ, who has lived, died, and risen again on behalf of people like us and who welcomes us as we come to Him in repentance and faith.” She would always nod in agreement. So let me leave with you the words of the first question and answer from the Heidelberg Catechism:

What is your only comfort in life and death?

That I am not my own, but belong with body and soul, both in life and in death, to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ. He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood, and has set me free from all the power of the devil. He also preserves me in such a way that without the will of my heavenly Father not a hair can fall from my head; indeed, all things must work together for my salvation. Therefore, by his Holy Spirit he also assures me of eternal life and makes me heartily willing and ready from now on to live for him.