Delia

This is Delia Callaghan. She saved my father from an orphanage.
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My father was nine when his mother died, and because his father was working across the country in Dublin, the only person available to care for him and his four siblings was his Aunt Delia. 


Delia took in 5 children between the ages of 7 and 15. They were an unruly bunch of kids, used to an absent father and a loving, but sick, mother. So there was Delia — a childless woman who desperately wanted to have her own children, but whose only baby died and she was never able to get pregnant again. She married a man who she loved but who her parents didn’t approve of. Before she became a caregiver of my dad’s family, she had taken in her other brother’s children. Her heartbreak, I imagine, turned into bitterness. As kids, my dad and his siblings hated her. In every story they tell of her, at least one of them is running toward her with a knife. She was a disciplinarian and did her best to civilize my father and his wild siblings, but she was resentful and cold. 


But she saved them. They didn’t get it at the time — they were grieving the loss of their mother. If it weren’t for Delia, my dad and his sisters and brothers would be separated into different orphanages around Ireland. 

Now that my dad and his siblings are older, they see what Delia did for them. She taught my dad to sew, which came in handy when he was in the U.S. Army and needed to patch his uniforms. It was because of Delia my dad developed a love of gardening. And they also realize how completely out of control they were as kids. I have my own children whom I love more than life itself, but my God! when they act like animals, it’s hard not to lose it. My heart goes out to Great-Aunt Delia who had to manage five children who she didn’t give birth to.

I find it easy to think of my loving mother and selfless grandmothers on Mother’s Day. It’s easy to honor them in person and in my heart.
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But who ever thought of Delia? Who ever wished Happy Mother’s Day to a woman who gave up so much of her life to care for other people’s children, a woman who didn’t get to hold her own baby in her arms? I highly doubt my father and aunts and uncles ever thanked Delia for keeping them together. For keeping them alive.



So I think of Delia this Mother’s Day. A woman who deserved much more than a card and a bouquet of flowers. She deserves a legacy. And I will promise to always honor her when I tell her story.