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I'm guessing she started using an eyelash curler in college in the late 1950s. She still uses one. Fifty years of daily eyelash curling is a routine which certainly reflects mom's devotion to a formal beauty regimen and princess persona.

About eight years ago, I was in Portugal and I saw a huge poster advertisement for Secret deodorant at a bus stop. It depicted a guy looking absolutely befuddled, incredulously examining an eyelash curler left on the sink counter by his girlfriend. The caption in Portuguese read: Há segredos que só as mulheres conhecem.

Roughly translated: "There are secrets that only women know."

The "secret" of that device is part of a daily routine that I've known my mother to do all her adult life. But early on, I believed it gave her special powers to "see" when I was misbehaving.

Steve Gruber of Raleigh

She played for us

My mother, Beverly Jean Halter, was a brilliant pianist.

Every evening, after putting all six of us children to bed, she ended her day by serenading us with an hour or two of passionate playing, from Bach and Beethoven to Burt Bacharach or the Beatles.

Sometimes several of us serenaded her back with bedtime whining. But she played on. She was a loving and devoted mother, yet this was her time to relax with her music.

She didn't have a piano in the early years of her marriage. It was something she wanted for a long time, and finally, she and my father were able to afford a high quality, secondhand piano.

It wasn't until years later that I realized her skills were at a professional level. Yet she never played for others, just for us.

She died, too young, more than 20 years ago. Whenever I happen to hear one of the many melodies she played, I can still see and hear her, in my mind, in the living room, playing that piano with the intensity and emotion of a true artist.

Lorilyn Bailey of Raleigh

The light still shines

This lamp was my mother's favorite thing since she received it from her fiance in 1920 as a gift. It always had a place of honor in her home as long as she lived, and I can certainly understand why she loved it so. The glass is marbled amber with copper metalwork. It has a light in the base and holds two bulbs under the shade. Although Mother is no longer with us it remains a favorite thing in our family. We have guarded it with loving care since she passed away in 1987. The story goes that the fiance gave the lamp to Mother while they were engaged. They became engaged on the front steps of her home, which remains today. They were never married and Mother went on to marry my father. The fiance also went on to marry someone else.

Grace Pennington of Fuquay-Varina

Miss Katie's pie safe

In the early '70s I moved with my husband and children to rural Harnett County. I became friends with Miss Katie. Miss Katie was considerably older than I, but we shared a passion for flower gardens. In one corner in Miss Katie's kitchen sat a dilapidated pie safe. She told me that the cupboard was the handiwork of her grandfather, who had been born a slave. He was a cooper, a barrel maker, and he took his surname from his trade.

Some years later Miss Katie's home was remodeled, and she would not have the old pie safe in her new kitchen. It was headed for the dump. I offered to buy it, but she refused payment. I promised that she would be first to view it when I could afford to get it redone. The broken cabinet went to my storage shed. By the time I finally got Miss Katie's pie safe restored, age and dementia had claimed her memory. She no longer recalled the pie safe nor recognized me. I went home and cried.

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