Mother And Son

Eight years after losing a bitter custody battle in Circuit Court and fleeing the state with her 5-year-old son, a former Finksburg mother was back in Carroll County last night to face kidnap charges.Sharon Elaine Wimperis, 50, was arrested Aug. 5 on a federal warrant at her apartment near Detroit by FBI agents. She was charged with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution for parental kidnapping.Federal marshals escorted her yesterday to Maryland, where she was turned over to state police and taken to Westminster to appear before District Court Commissioner Emmett V. Jones last night.

A mother and son were rescued early yesterday from the second floor of a burning rowhouse in East Baltimore.Firefighters arrived in the 100 block of N. Port St. at 7: 50 a.m after receiving a call from a neighbor, said Battalion Chief Hector Torres.Torres said the single-alarm fire was quickly contained.Mary Anne Geiser, 34, was taken to Johns Hopkins Hospital, and her son, David Green, 10, was transported to Johns Hopkins Bayview. Both were listed in stable condition and were being treated for smoke inhalation.

A Pasadena mother and son died late Friday night in a head-on collision on the Sparrows Point viaduct near Bethlehem Steel Corp.Peggy Watson, 55, and Clarence Charles Fox Jr., 28, both of the 800 block of Swift Road, died in the crash, which also seriously injured Fox's fiancee and an 11-year-old passenger.The driver of the second car, Clifton Ken Phillip, 32, of the 800 block of Corktree Road in Baltimore County, suffered an ankle injury but declined treatment, according to the Maryland Transportation Authority.

"The Art Fair," by David Lipsky.Doubleday. 271 pages. $22.50.The novel's narrator, Richard Freely, is a precocious youngster who is shuttled between his artist mother in Manhattan and his writer father in Los Angeles. Their split was brought on by their mother's sudden arrival in the art world.Before she gained fame, their lives were idyllic, but as her work garned attention, the family life crumbled.If Lipsky's book reads so remarkably assured, perhaps it's because his story is drawn from real life: He is the son of painter Pat Lipsky Sutton.

Family therapist Olga Silverstein and journalist Beth Rashbaum declare that it takes courage to raise good men because raising sons to be independent and good providers, as well as emotionally open, is so very hard.It has largely been, and still is, the job of mother; indeed, since an estimated 25 percent of the children in the United States -- an unprecedented amount -- have little or no contact with their fathers, it appears that rearing sons (and daughters) is solely the mother's job even more than before.

The death of Virginia Kelley, President Bill Clinton's mother, is especially stunning because she was such a survivor. It is a shame to observe that this lively woman did not live to see her son complete his first year in office.She married five times, twice to the same man (Mr. Clinton's stepfather). Three of her husbands died, one in a car accident, one of alcoholism, one of diabetes. One son went to jail for drug possession. These are heavy blows for anyone to bear.It is common to hear that she bore up because she's a strong woman.

By yesterday afternoon, state medical examiners concluded what Baltimore County police already suspected: Ruhama Jane Murphy, 44, and her son, Larry Bruce Price, 22, committed suicide in a Washington Boulevard motel room.But no one seemed to know why."We don't know," said Mary Lou Fisher, Mrs. Murphy's mother. "We just don't know . . . and I'll probably never know why."Police found Mrs. Murphy and her son about 6:15 p.m. Monday in the bathroom of a locked motel room. The pair checked into the room Sunday night, said E. Jay Miller, county police spokesman.

As Thelma Semone stood by the front window of her home yesterday waiting for her son to arrive, she looked like any anxious mother with news to tell. But it wasn't any ordinary day.When 57-year-old Roy Semone drove up to the Glen Burnie house and stepped inside, he said hello to a mother he hadn't seen in more than a half-century.Roy Semone was just 10 months old when he was taken from his mother and placed into an orphanage. Until a month ago, he didn't even know if she was alive -- let alone that she lived in Glen Burnie, not that far from his Southwest Baltimore home.

NEW YORK -- Rosemary Holmstrom and her son, C. J., wer watching Magic Johnson talk about the AIDS virus on television when the bright, active 7-year-old asked his mother a natural and innocent question."

LOS ANGELES -- For almost 30 years, Sherry Cowa searched for her son, not knowing what had become of the red-haired toddler she last saw when he was just a year old.Then three weeks ago, the phone rang and the suburban Mission Hills woman learned her son was alive -- and looking for her."I still can't believe it, even though he's right here," said Ms. Cowan, 48, of David Dills, 30, of North Augusta, S.C., after a friend helped reunite the mother and son Friday as a surprise for Mr. Dills.

Debbie Phelps has cast off the mantle of "America's Mother" for something a little more Sir Thomas More. Henceforth, the world's most famous swimming mom is to be known as "A Mother for All Seasons." That's the title of her memoir, which hit bookstores last week. Why not invoke the saint who stood up to Henry VIII in a tale about a single mom who raised an Olympic phenom? Only Phelps doesn't lose her head, even in the part - page 272 of the 274-page book - about Michael Phelps' bong picture.

In a time of war, an American woman named Rosie worries about her son, a guard overseas, while a Middle Eastern woman named Zaira worries about her son, a taxicab driver who has gone missing. In the play The Blessed Mothers of War, the two mothers are miles apart but their stories are similar because of their worry and fear for their sons. "I think my play will evoke a great deal of emotion from audiences," said Ty DeMartino, the author of the play, which is one of nine included in this year's Baltimore Playwrights Festival.

Kevin Hughes and his mother, Terry, have always been close. As a boy, he loved to sit and chat with his mother and her girlfriends when they came over for coffee. When he was teased by other kids, his mother was there for him, shoring him up, complaining to school officials. When it appeared that sports would not be his thing, she got him involved in what became his love: theater. Today, though he's in New York City and she's in a Detroit suburb, they get together whenever they can. "We shop together; we dine together; we talk about boys and sex together," said Hughes, who is gay. "My mother has said on a number of occasions that it's like having the perfect son and the perfect daughter all wrapped up into one person -- not only a son, but a daughter."

BOSTON - I'm not supposed to like Desperate Housewives. It's either post-feminist or pre-feminist. It's too racy or too retro. It's either an example of the backlash or a product of the cultural collapse. The show's steaminess has the American Family Association railing against its sex in the suburbs. Its locker room promo on Monday Night Football has the FCC in wardrobe malfunction mode. So sue me. This show had me from hello. It wasn't the mystery or the lingerie. It was Lynette. In the very first episode, the woman who left her high-powered job to be overwhelmed by four kids ran into a coiffed and manicured former co-worker who asked how she likes her new life.

A mother and son were killed yesterday afternoon when a car driven by the woman's husband was struck by a vehicle at a Frederick intersection, the Frederick County sheriff's office reported. David Mervin Meck, 49, was trying to cross Route 15 at Willow Road and failed to yield to oncoming traffic when his 1999 Chevrolet Malibu was struck by a southbound 1998 Jeep Cherokee driven by Charles Douglas Flammia, 61, of Charlottesville, Va., the sheriff's office said. Flammia was released after hospital treatment, while Meck was in critical condition at Maryland Shock Trauma Center.

Boston College stuffed the football prospect with lobster and steak and took him on a tour of Fenway Park. Notre Dame painted his name on a varsity locker, then flashed it in bright lights on its scoreboard. This weekend, it's Maryland's turn to try to turn Ambrose Wooden's head - as well as his arms and legs - toward College Park for the next four years. One highlight: a catered dinner held last night at the home of coach Ralph Friedgen. It's the height of recruiting season for Wooden, Gilman School's prized quarterback, and hundreds of other Division I college wannabes.

Dear Mr. Azrael, I have a friend who is a senior citizen and she has her son on the deed of her home as a joint tenant. She lives in the house, pays the mortgage, the taxes, the insurance, the repairs, etc., and he contributes absolutely nothing toward the property. He denies her access to buildings on the property, and he has destroyed and vandalized the property. He wanted his mother to sell the house, but she refused; he has filed in court to force a sale of the house. She put $67,000 down on the property and has made all the payments.

Fleeing America to save a child A fable: Once upon a time an Iraqi Shiite Muslim woman came to the University of Maryland as a graduate student. To the surprise and honor of her family in Baghdad, she fell in love with and married an American Christian man. They had a son and lived together for three years just outside College Park, but all was not sweetness and harmony. The couple divorced. Although the mother had custody of their son, the father had significant visitation rights, which he exercised often and lovingly.

A mother and son were rescued early yesterday from the second floor of a burning rowhouse in East Baltimore.Firefighters arrived in the 100 block of N. Port St. at 7: 50 a.m after receiving a call from a neighbor, said Battalion Chief Hector Torres.Torres said the single-alarm fire was quickly contained.Mary Anne Geiser, 34, was taken to Johns Hopkins Hospital, and her son, David Green, 10, was transported to Johns Hopkins Bayview. Both were listed in stable condition and were being treated for smoke inhalation.

Eight years after losing a bitter custody battle in Circuit Court and fleeing the state with her 5-year-old son, a former Finksburg mother was back in Carroll County last night to face kidnap charges.Sharon Elaine Wimperis, 50, was arrested Aug. 5 on a federal warrant at her apartment near Detroit by FBI agents. She was charged with unlawful flight to avoid prosecution for parental kidnapping.Federal marshals escorted her yesterday to Maryland, where she was turned over to state police and taken to Westminster to appear before District Court Commissioner Emmett V. Jones last night.