My mom's legacy lives on

Wow! It has been 18 years since my mom left us. March 15, 2001 was a different type of day. I wasn't sad because my mom had fought a good fight. She was like 1 in every 8 women who have breast cancer. After fighting hard and beating it, that monster came back with a vengence.

Of course we wanted her here with us, but she had done her job and had done it well. She along with my dad, Robert Wilson, they raised me and my siblings - Derek, Ingrid and Angela to be respectable, responsible and giving people. She was a stay at home mom until we were in high school. The funny thing was that she was so active in our education, she was at the school as much as us. She took our education and the education of all kids so seriously that she ran for school board and served for over ten years. Upon her death, the City of River Rouge named a street by the high school Regina Wilson Way.

Many people remember her when they see the street, but I remember her everyday. She lives in me, I am her. I always want to think it's because she is Regina and I am Gina, but that is not a fact because she lives in all four of us.

My mom showed us how to be a loving mom by putting us first. She made sure we had what we needed and most of what we wanted. We had to do our homework and she made sure we were involved in many activities (dance classes and ice skating at the Beechwood Center), and attended church. We even went to Circle Y Church Camp.

She also demonstrated the importance of family. We spent our Sundays with grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins in the country at 'The Farm' learning from each other. Our values were set and formed while preparing our dinner. Yep, picking stringbeans from the garden and poping them, picking feathers off the chicken that was just running in the chicken coop or getting eggs that the chickens had laid the day before. Those values prove that we can live off the land if things get bad.

But what she shared most with us that will live on is not to be shelfish. To whom much is given, much is expected...We all have a passion to serve and help others. Each of us in our own rights are involved in community groups, educational programs and mentoring other youth and young adults. So not only are her values in her four children, her values are in the families she shared herself with in the school district and in headstart, but also in the people that we share OUR lives with.

Happy Women's History Month to my mom, a woman who rocked!

Gina Wilson Steward

CEO