Mommy

My mommy passed away 11 years ago come January 23rd.  11 years.  Where the heck did that time go?  And trust me, even though it has been 11 years, it feels like yesterday.

We all have those moments in our lives…that no matter how much distance we have from them, they are marked in our minds and in our hearts…like a photo negative burned in our skin.

We did joke that mom did aptly “picked” the date 1/23….because it was neat and chronological….1, 2, 3.  Mom always was neat and orderly.  And the year was 2000.  What a way to start a new year, a new decade, a new century, and a new millennium.  Mom had a way of being memorable.

This is what I miss.

Her giggle.  She would press her lips together and giggle.
Her lap.  I would crawl up and sit in it – even as an adult.
Her ham and cheese sandwiches.  Not that they were extraordinary – they were just hers.
Her quiet ways.
Her always asking me what I was doing with my hair – with an air of disapproval.
Her leaving me voicemails always starting with “This is your mother…”.
Her fully stocked refrigerator and how she always made sure to have what we wanted when we came home.
Her apple crumb pie.
Her purchase of numerous blouses and flat shoes, all the same style, in every color.
Her glass of water by her bedside.
Her half a stick of gum that she would chew and offer you the other half.
Her pocketbook filled with tissues.
Her fake fur coat that she wore when I was young, that I would lean up against in the front seat of the car.
Her managing 4 children and a husband without batting an eye.
Her love of egg salad.
Her verbal descriptions of the backrubs we would give her as kids, as “delicious.”
Her routine of brewing fresh iced tea for my dad everyday.
Her career as a nurse.
Her ability to see a crumb drop from across the room.
Her love of sleeping in a freezing room.
Her love of Perry Como’s Christmas album that she would play every year.
Her way of never looking at the camera when someone took a picture.
Her standing beside me as my maid of honor on my wedding day.

These are snippets really.  Of a beautiful, giving, self-less woman, who left this world at the age of 67, due to that thief we call cancer.

I don’t think of her as gone…ever….because she truly lives on inside me, through me.  I am her daughter.  And each night before I sleep, I say these words – so that not one day will go by without my remembering and acknowledging her.

“Thank you Lord for this day, may I be blessed with another.  Keep my mother safe and warm and grant her peace.  I love you mom. Amen.”

I miss you.