Dear Mom,
It’s a strange coincidence that the six-month anniversary of your death just happens to fall on Mother’s Day. Six months - sometimes it feels like six days.
As you would expect, I’ve had my moments since you’ve been gone. I still catch myself picking up my cell phone to call you.
Sometimes it’s to share news or a story, but oftentimes it’s just to say hello and to hear your voice. The letdown I feel when I realize that you’re not there to pick up always leaves an ache in my heart.
My meltdowns,when I have them, happen mostly in private. I can be driving somewhere and I’ll see something that will spark a thought or a memory, and the tears that immediately sting my eyes threaten to spill. But it’s usually late at night when I’m in the shower that I allow myself to give in to my grief and to let the tears fall. Admittedly, there are times when those same tears turn into deep, soul-wracking sobs. Missing you, at times, is an overwhelming emotion.
I wonder if you witnessed my first ‘public’ meltdown a few weeks ago. I had stopped at Hallmark to get balloons for a friend and decided that while I was there, I might as well get my card shopping done. Because I had a few Mother’s Day cards to get, I decided to hit that section first. However, while standing there, the reality of you not being here on Mother’s Day was like a hard fist to the gut. It was as if the wind had suddenly been knocked out of me and that dreaded feeling of claustrophobia crept in, pulling me under and wrapping me in a dark shroud of sorrow. As hot tears blurred my vision, it was all I could do to pay for the balloons, offer a hurried explanation and get out the store. Once inside my car, I laid my head on my steering wheel and sobbed.
I can tell you that your LynsayLoo missed the sound of her Mimi’s voice singing to her on her birthday. It was then that I realized that I would never again hear you sing to me on my birthday.
But not all days are sad or hard days. There are happy days and joyous occasions where I know, had you been here, you would have been touched and proud.
Like the simple gesture of a gold cross being passed down from one generation to another. The same gold cross that was passed down to you and then to me, has now been passed down to your granddaughter. She was as touched as I was when you gave it me, and she wore it proudly for her confirmation and 1st Communion. You would have been so proud of her.
You would also be proud of her college graduation. She graduated from UNO with a triple major this weekend and she will soon be blazing her own path to the tune of, “My Way.”
In the short time that you’ve been gone, I’ve lost a childhood friend to cancer and then Raf to a sudden and totally unexpected heart attack. The finality of losing Raf has yet to set in. And although this first year of your passing has and will bring me more than my share of melancholy moments, it will also be a year where happiness will be scattered throughout, floating like the bright stars that fill the night sky.
Although it will be my first Mother’s Day without you, it’s the first year in two years that I’ll be with Ryan and Lynsay. This was the first Christmas in years that I was able to spend it with my sister and I hope that it was the first of many.
This year, your grandson had a milestone birthday - he’s now a quarter of a century old. It seems like yesterday when you would hold him in your arms and he’d make all those funny, “Ryan” faces. Now he’s renting a home, has a good job and is enjoying this stage of his life.
Our big joyous occasion this year will be Lynsay’s wedding. Along with her confirmation, her 1st Communion and college graduation, my Stinkerbell is getting married. I can still see in my minds eye her little fingernails with pink polish on them. She was so proud of those and you were so proud that she sat there so still, letting you paint her nails for the first time.
Like a sprinkling of Tinkerbell’s pixie dust, these past memories and upcoming moments fill my heart with love and warmth, despite the absence of you.
Your grandchildren ~ I know that you would be so proud of them.
As I come to the close of this letter, I wonder, as I so often do, if you knew how much I loved you. Did I show you that even though you didn’t give birth to me in the usual sense, you were my mother in every way imaginable. Did you know how lucky and truly blessed I felt that you ‘chose’ me, and that in my heart, you are my only mother. In spite of my flaws and countless imperfections, you loved me anyway, and you did so uncondtionally.
I hope I made you proud ~
With all my Love,
Happy Mother’s Day
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