Many times I wrote about my mom on my old blog, and I’m not sure what more I could say now that I haven’t thought, said, or written repeatedly in the past. But it’s Mother’s Day, and while I am here, she is no longer, and so remembering is what remains.

I wonder sometimes if she would even recognize me now, almost seventeen years to the day since she passed away. Of course deep down I’m pretty sure she would, but so much has changed in me since that time, that were we to sit together today I think she would be surprised. The strange thing is, in imagining us physically together now, in my mind’s eye she would be the same age as when I last saw her, and yet I would be much older, nearly her age. So I can’t make the scenario work no matter how hard I try.

I think when we lose someone we love we can go many years maintaining the relationship in our minds just where it left off, sort of fixating it at the last known reference point. As more times passes, it becomes exceedingly difficult to hold that story together. It’s as if in hoping to preserve the relationship we attempt to freeze it solid in our minds. But this isn’t the nature of our being, and eventually we have allow it to melt and become formless.

My mom and I cannot sit together today at the kitchen table, and talk and drink iced tea as we did all those years ago. I can longer come to her for advice or reassurance that I’m doing okay. I can’t look into her eyes and see the reflection of the young woman I was, who was to her perfection. Oh, I can remember our time together warmly, and even pull out a photograph to make it more vivid, but to truly endure, our connection must now exist on a different, more fluid plane of being.

Happy Mother’s Day, Mom. The raw and tender life you gave me, the love you surrounded me with, and the enormous void your leaving created, continue to be my greatest teachers.



Love always,

~Cynthia