Mutual respect & streak-free windows. What's your best advice from mom?

Pawan Handa, a retired Goodyear executive, this week talks about his mom, Sudershan Kumari Handa, as his sits in front of a painting of her that his wife commissioned. Among other things, Handa says his mother taught him to respect everyone equally and do what you can for others without expecting anything in return.

When Pawan Handa’s aging mom needed help at her modest home in New Delhi, her family hired a woman to clean and do other chores.

Handa, a retired Goodyear executive, said his mother – Sudershan Kumari Handa – accepted this help, but also made a point of serving the cleaning woman a cup of tea and stuffed Indian bread called “prantha” every day she visited.

This troubled Pawan’s dad, who asked his wife why she was spending the family’s scant resources feeding a cleaning woman.

“From that day on, my mother shared half a cup of tea and half a prantha with the lady and drank/ate the other half (herself),” Pawan Handa recently recalled, reading aloud from a book of memories he wrote for his family.

Sudershan Kumari Handa then told her husband she was no longer wasting money because she was taking food out of her own mouth to feed the cleaning woman.

“Sharing and respecting everyone irrespective of their societal standing brought a lot of happiness to my mom, this has become one of the core principles of my life,” said Handa, who lives in Fairlawn.

On this Mother’s Day, the Akron Beacon Journal is highlighting what some of its readers shared as the best advice they ever received from their moms – either through words, or, like Handa’s mom, through deeds.

Advice from Mom for everything from streak-free windows to debt-free living

Some of the advice is practical.

“My sweet 93-year-old mama taught me to wash windows vertically on the inside and horizontally outside, vinegar in the water and The Beacon Journal to dry,” said Pamela Buchtel Andrella, recounting a lifelong lesson taught by Stella Buchtel.

“Granted, it’s not sage advice that will help you find a life partner, but it will save you time that you can use to search for that life partner,” Buchtel Andrella mused. “AND, who doesn’t love clean windows?”

Pamela Buchtel Andrella, left, stands with her 93-year-old mom, Stella Buchtel. Every Saturday, Stella puts a bandana on and cleans the house. One of the tricks she passed on to Pamela was key to streak-free windows. It involves vinegar, old copies of the Akron Beacon Journal and changing up which direction you clean the windows, inside and out.

Other practical advice came from mothers-in-law.

Barb Baltrinic of Munroe Falls said her mother-in-law, Connie Baltrinic, earned the nickname “Cash and Carry Connie” because she refused to pay interest, even on large-ticket items that many people purchase with credit cards.

Connie instead used 30-, 60-, or 90-day same-as-cash offers and paid the bills early to avoid late fees. 

“I learned these lessons well and followed her role model as it saved me a lot of money over the years,” Barb said.

104-year-old mom shared advice for a happy, healthy — and long — life

Other Greater Akron moms offered more universal advice.

Laura Farris-Daugherty said her mom shared her philosophy with everyone she knew: Eat right, exercise and do something for someone else.

Her mom, Leona W. Farris, and dad, family physician Dr. Melvin Farris, were pioneers, among the first African Americans to live in Stow after building a home on Fishcreek Road in the early 1950s. 

“She lived to be 104½ years old," Laura Farris-Daugherty said. “Her words are a part of my daily life. I keep my body moving and choose mostly healthy foods … (and) in my own way I volunteer and support my bonus chosen family.”

Laura Farris-Daugherty, left, seen here with her mom, Leona W. Farris. Leona and her husband, family physician Dr. Melvin Farris, were pioneers, among the first African Americans to live in Stow after building a home on Fishcreek Road in the early 1950s. Leona died in 2022.

Tough love from Mom: 'No whining'

There were also moms nudging their children to be self-sufficient.

Polly Leonard Keener of Akron said her mom was loving, but “didn’t suffer foolishness gladly."

“I particularly remember her saying, ‘Smile and the world smiles with you. Cry and you cry alone,” Leonard Keener said. 

“In other words, if you have a problem, handle it,” she said. “No whining.”

He mom, June Leonard, was an elementary school and special reading teacher in Akron Public Schools. June always encouraged kids to read and kept a stash of comic books for students to read during free times.

“No wonder I grew up to be a cartoonist and do humorous illustrations for my career!” Polly Leonard Keener said.

Maybe Mom isn't always right

But don’t think everyone took all their mom’s advice, said Judi Christy, director of marketing and communications for the Akron-Area YMCAs.

“There were only two topics of advice that my mother gave me in her 91 years on the planet,” Christy said.

“She advised me to never get married. She also advised me to never quit working,” Christy said.

This summer, Christy and her husband will celebrate their 43rd wedding anniversary and, in January, Christy will retire.

“Thanks, Mom. I think,” Christy said. 

Remembering Mom on Mother's Day — and every day

Other advice, it turns out, evolves with us as we age and experience life in different ways.

“One of the best pieces of advice my mom shared with me was this, ‘This too shall pass,” said Marilyn Chase Purdy, who lives in Portage Lakes.

“Growing up, we all go through difficult times, or times that we, as young people, perceive to be difficult. This advice helped me through embarrassments, sadness, difficulties and the inevitable heartbreaks,” she said.

“Most of the time, it's still true today,” she said. 

Marilyn Chase Purdy, of Portage Lakes, still lives by her mother's words: "This too shall pass." Marilyn, seen here in a hat for the Kentucky Derby this year, says her understanding of the phrase has evolved with her life experiences.

But not always. Purdy’s first husband died when he was 43 and, for a time, she was a single mother of three young boys, now all grown, one with children of his own.

“When you’re seeing peers diagnosed with serious illnesses or losing a spouse,” Purdy said she does not verbalize her mom’s wisdom of “This too shall pass.”

It’s mostly true, she said, but the passage will take years, not the days or weeks required to heal from a teenage heartache.

Purdy, like many in their 60s, 70s and beyond, said she looks back and thinks of her mom − Mary Purdy − and how different her life was from that of her own.

Mary Purdy grew up in a coal mining company town in Pennsylvania before moving to Cleveland for school and meeting her future husband.

Her parents were immigrants from Czechoslovakia. Her husband’s parents were ethnic Slovaks who also immigrated to the U.S. 

And though her mom never learned to drive – like many women of that generation – she was never alone because people in their tight-knit Slovak neighborhood were always visiting each other’s homes.

Marilyn Chase Purdy misses that sort of intimacy.

“Now people get together at restaurants, wineries and tea places,” she said. 

She enjoys going to those, too, but said it’s not the same as welcoming people into your safe space, to feed them food you made especially for them and to let them linger as long as they like, without the obligation of giving up a restaurant table to waiting customers.

Marilyn, a retired teacher, is now working on a book she plans to self-publish called “The Lost Art of Entertaining in Your Home,” hoping to inspire younger generations to embrace what her childhood neighborhood embraced.

On Mother’s Day, Marilyn said she’s not going out.

“I like to tell my sons not to get me anything … a visit or a phone call is better,” she said, hoping to see her two grandchildren, Lucy, 5, and Charles, 9. 

In Fairlawn, Handa doesn't plan to fuss much on Mother’s Day, either.

He and his wife have three children who now live in three cities: Chicago, Cincinnati and Nashville.

“I really believe in doing things that are unexpected,” he said. “I don’t wait for Mother’s Day. I like to surprise people.”

He said he sees parallels between special holidays like Mother’s Day and across-the-board merit raises at work.

When everyone gets the same gift or the same raise once a year, it doesn’t feel as valuable. 

“Surprises are more meaningful in my view,” he said.

Handa, will, however be thinking of his mother, who died in India in 2010.

Not a day passes when Handa doesn’t remember her.

The two biggest lessons he learned from her are: Respect all equally and do what you can for others without expecting anything in return, both of which are illustrated by his mom feeding the cleaning lady, he said.

“My mom will always be present in my life. Anytime I want to see her, I close my eyes and she appears,” he said. “I am confident it will continue that way.”

Editor's note: Pawan Handa is a citizen member of the Akron Beacon Journal's editorial board.

Beacon Journal reporter Amanda Garrett can be reached at [email protected].