My Mother

Four years ago today, I lost my mother. I got a call about 8:30 in the morning from her nurse that she was passing. There was no way to get to her as she was a little over two hours away and her time was now. All I could do was to sit there with my thoughts. I looked up at the formal gown hanging on my bedroom door. We were all flying out the next morning halfway across the country to attend my step-daughter's big wedding. "Why now?" I selfishly thought. Then the next call came. It was over. She was gone. It had probably only been about 20 minutes. Seems like a pretty short piece of time for such an important event.

Really I had been in the process of losing my mother for about 3-4 years. Parkinson's disease and old age had been slowly taking her away from us. My mother's hands became very, very important to me. When she wasn't making a lot of sense and was losing her ability to communicate, her hands were the only things that seemed familiar. Mother always had beautiful hands. I could look at them and, although they were aging and getting more "life lines", they were still the hands that stroked me as a child and the hands that I had clung to and played with. I knew every finger and they always looked gentle and comforting to me. Even as an adult.

I miss my mother. Sometimes I think I miss her more now than the day she died. We had spent so long on the "business" of losing her (nursing care, many visits, cheerful cards and then memorials to be planned, houses to be emptied and sold, treasures to be divided, people to be remembered, etc.) that the emptiness is pushed back somewhere deep down. At the time, I was really blessed to somehow sense the happiness that my parents were now together in another life. They had a wonderful love story and had been apart for 20 years. I know it sounds crazy, but somewhere inside I could feel their joy. But right now, I feel like a child that misses the comfort and support that she provided. Someone to cry on about my son, her beloved grandson, and all that he is going through and all that he has put us through. Someone else that you can share it all with, holding back nothing and know that they will still love him in the end just like you do. Someone that you don't have to be strong for.

Those days four years ago were hard. Hub and I were torn between many emotions and family obligations. This all happened on a Thursday. He and I drove to my hometown to meet my brother & sister to make arrangements. My sister is the oldest by 13 years, then my brother and then me. I love my sister dearly, but somehow at these times she always has some kind of tantrum, chip on her shoulder or weird meltdown and makes it more of a nightmare. All of us are hurting and trying to be supportive of each other and then deal with her. Hub and I drive home and then he and my older son fly out Friday morning for the wedding. My younger son and I return to my hometown the next day and are there for the visitation on Saturday. The wedding was also on Saturday, September 11 (that's another story) and hub and son took a red-eye flight back to Texas. They arrived Sunday about an hour before the service. Then it was over. We all went back to our respective homes and lived our lives.

How weird are the rituals of lives? We seem to mark events as a way to celebrate them and sometimes as a way to just get through them. Some good, some bad. Births, birthdays, weddings, deaths, funerals and then we start over again.

Life can be strange, but I still miss my Mom.

Later.