A little epilogue to Mother Thea

We all have our memories of Mother Thea. I have mine and would like to write some lines as cover letters to the accompanying CD. Why am I doing this now. Well, sooner or later your children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren will start asking about their roots.

And then it is natural for Mother Thea to show up. Elin Theresia Svedin was her maiden name and she later married Jonas Karlfrid Wiklund. When she was to marry ”Kalle” she got a ”good” advice from her mother ”Remember never to say anything to Kalle. ”And I don’t think she did either, although she must have received it sometimes. But for that she was not a messy person. On the contrary, she still lived her own life.

Family love and always a concern for everyone. She was happy too, and with a temper that probably made Kalle think of himself, although he was obviously the head of the family. If he went too far, she burned him so he could say ”It appears that you were born on a spruce bed”. She was, too, but that’s another story. In her early years she had a nickname ”Ettertea” but that she meant was due to the initials in her first name. A person I knew at that time expressed himself confidently. Thea kind – Cold string.

Well, these lines should tell you mainly about Mother Thea, so I will return to her. After Karlfrid’s death in 1969, we got to see a Thea who was constantly growing and created both respect for his person and affection through his way of being. Can you imagine that she was the only person in Domsjö to pick up flower bouquets at the flower shop and then visit single people and talk away for a while and tell what attracted them to the community. This can be called social care of the better kind.

She had to do all her work and work. Last in bed and first up in the morning. Make fire and fix food before Kalle went to work. Same thing on Sunday when he was out hunting. Yes, a lot can be said and yet, not much has been said.

I do not think she had a single enemy even though she had opinions on most things I think this was due to her interest in people. Big as small, old and young. Many of her good friends were both 50, 60 and 70 years younger than herself. Yes, and then we have that memory. She was like a reference book. Years, names, events and usually with details that made us amazed.

All this paired with humor and easy laughter made Thea completely unique. In short, an amazing person I remember an event from Örnsköldsvik’s Lasarett – it was only a month before she passed away. All the nurses always made a case for Thea before they completed the pass and before they started their pass. One morning at the round, a young doctor asked how many children she had had. Thea answered 6 own and 1 foster child. “Oh, well you have many grandchildren and great grandchildren.

Yes, grandchildren I have got 12 and great grandchildren I have got 22 and the 23rd (Sebastian – Kristers boy) is in the process replied Thea. Fantastic, but can you keep track of what everyone is saying says the friendly doctor and then Mother Thea adds that ”if the doctor has time so sit down on the bedside he should hear and so did the doctor.”

Yes, there is much to say about Mother Thea, but a lot of you know when you listen to the CD, Maybe some questions come up that give you a reason to call and talk for a while.

The attentive one will probably wonder if there were really 13 siblings. Yes, some fell away, but we must remember that since Thea was the youngest, some had died during her youth. I have taken the names of these siblings of Ralph’s children from the United States.

One thing I regret in connection with the recording. Just concentrating on the genus. It would have been exciting to know more about what daily life was like when she was growing up.

The youngest son Stig wrote this in December 2006.