Since we buried my mother on my birthday, I find myself very melancholy when my birthday roles around. I have learned to let people celebrate me so there is a festive air surrounding the date and yet ... I also feel the need to pull away and just think and feel. Some people might think that having those two days tied together would be so unfair. But I don't. It is bittersweet in many ways but so is getting older!
Life is finally starting to make more sense in your 50's but your body just can't do everything it used to. I've accepted some limitations when it comes to sleeping on the floor or pulling an all nighter. I really pay for that stuff now!
In truth, however, my birthday has always been tied to my mother whether I realized it or not. That is the day she gave birth to me. After the funeral my Aunt, my mother's sister, said to me that my birthday was one of the happiest days of my mother's life. I can believe that knowing what I know about her life at that time. She was in a hard space with a lot of unknowns and a pocket full of rejection from people created to love her.
So God gave her me.
Taking time to meditate on that on my birthday is a bittersweet gift that makes me smile and cry at the same time. It causes me to lift my eyes to God and say thank you while sitting in awe at the orchestration of my life. I weep because I miss her. I smile when I remember her as my softball coach. I long to see her again in heaven as she was intended and maybe for the first time meet the woman God created to be my mother before she was ravaged by the world. I wish I could just feel the warmth of her skin again. That's all we had left at the end after the disease had run its course. Just the warmth of her skin. I took that for granted my whole life and only held the gift for a moment right at the very end.
I miss you mom.
You would be so proud of your grandkids! They are truly amazing people. They would have brought you so much joy. A part of me wants to believe that you can see them through the veil. That somehow you are still showing their pictures to everyone in heaven on a regular basis. I know you would because you did it all the time down here.
But I think you would be proud of me too. I have fought for my marriage and stood up for what was right even when most people turned away from me for what was easy. I have been an advocate for the oppressed while becoming a bringer of peace in as much as it has depended upon me. I have sought humility and forgiveness for the ways I have failed my children. Above all I have run hard after my God believing that He would heal our families wounds. We aren't done yet, but we are moving in the right direction.
I still have a birthday card you sent me many years ago that was huge and sang to you when you opened it. So over the top! But just like you! It makes me smile now, or perhaps smirk and roll my eyes a bit. Either way I'm glad I have it. Funny what stays with us in the end.
Wish you were here.
Love
Andee
Wednesday, September 16, 2020
Tuesday, May 12, 2020
Mother's Day 2020
She's been gone for 2.5 years now and yet . . .
How does that happen? How does someone never die even after they die? I was starting to feel sad a few days before Mother's Day and didn't even realize it was related to missing my mother. I spoke to someone the other day whose mother has been gone for many years and yet clearly she is alive in their heart and even influencing their life still.
This is the blessing and curse of being a mother I suppose.
We have so much influence and yet we can feel so powerless at the same time. It is a role full of paradox. Our children need us desperately and yet they push us away in order to become themselves. We can be quickly blamed for a myriad of things and then years later be thanked for the exact same things.
Who would want to be a mother?
Well, my mother did and I am glad she did. In the 60's there were ways to end a pregnancy even though it was not legal yet. I was not a planned pregnancy and my presence forced a lot of people to make some decisions. But my mother never treated me that way. She never spoke a word about me being an unwanted pregnancy. In fact she had me baptized in the Catholic church even after they wouldn't let her get married in the church because she was pregnant prior to getting married. That is a tremendous act of humility on my mother's part and from what I can tell, she may have been all alone when she did it too.
That is a gift she gave me when she was 19 years old that I have only come to appreciate now as a 53 year old woman.
Who would want to be a mother?
In the past year I have begun to explore my own Catholic journey. It is not something that was ever on my "to do" list until God put it on my "get this done" list. So now the humble act of my mother 53 years ago is a gift to me today even though she has been gone for 2.5 years. How did God do that?
That might be why people become mothers.
A mother never dies and they can bless you even from the other side. It's a really hard job though. A single day of celebration seems hardly fitting for all that a mother does. But as a mother myself, I know I am not in it for the praise. I am in love. I am in love with my children and the God who made them. I am also thankful for my husband for being on the ride with me and I love him too!
So thank you mom. I am a good mom and you get some credit for that. Thank you for gifts I am still discovering. May I offer my children the same after my days on this earth are spent.
Miss you,
Andee
How does that happen? How does someone never die even after they die? I was starting to feel sad a few days before Mother's Day and didn't even realize it was related to missing my mother. I spoke to someone the other day whose mother has been gone for many years and yet clearly she is alive in their heart and even influencing their life still.
This is the blessing and curse of being a mother I suppose.
We have so much influence and yet we can feel so powerless at the same time. It is a role full of paradox. Our children need us desperately and yet they push us away in order to become themselves. We can be quickly blamed for a myriad of things and then years later be thanked for the exact same things.
Who would want to be a mother?
Well, my mother did and I am glad she did. In the 60's there were ways to end a pregnancy even though it was not legal yet. I was not a planned pregnancy and my presence forced a lot of people to make some decisions. But my mother never treated me that way. She never spoke a word about me being an unwanted pregnancy. In fact she had me baptized in the Catholic church even after they wouldn't let her get married in the church because she was pregnant prior to getting married. That is a tremendous act of humility on my mother's part and from what I can tell, she may have been all alone when she did it too.
That is a gift she gave me when she was 19 years old that I have only come to appreciate now as a 53 year old woman.
Who would want to be a mother?
In the past year I have begun to explore my own Catholic journey. It is not something that was ever on my "to do" list until God put it on my "get this done" list. So now the humble act of my mother 53 years ago is a gift to me today even though she has been gone for 2.5 years. How did God do that?
That might be why people become mothers.
A mother never dies and they can bless you even from the other side. It's a really hard job though. A single day of celebration seems hardly fitting for all that a mother does. But as a mother myself, I know I am not in it for the praise. I am in love. I am in love with my children and the God who made them. I am also thankful for my husband for being on the ride with me and I love him too!
So thank you mom. I am a good mom and you get some credit for that. Thank you for gifts I am still discovering. May I offer my children the same after my days on this earth are spent.
Miss you,
Andee
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