Picture Boards

It's amazing the frenzy I can work myself into. I was pretty sure looking at the picture boards from my mom's funeral would be an awful, painful, teary experience. Thought they might make me feel sad, which is an emotion I don't need any more of right now.

But guess what? I was wrong.

Decided to take them out and share them with someone on Monday. Again, expecting an outpouring of emotion, I decided to bring them with me to my weekly hour on the couch (it's no secret I'm an advocate of therapy!). 

To my surprise, opening them up and going through the photos with someone who had never met my mom actually made the experience fun. I got to talk about her, tell her story, smile. Heck, I even laughed a bit. 

I have a friend to thank for suggesting I show them to someone... Thanks for your wisdom, Korey. I wish you didn't know firsthand that it would make me feel better, but you do. You're next to "meet" my mom and to hear the stories. Until then, I'm gonna share her beauty, spirit and smile here.

Enjoy!

I'm always amazed that my mom moved to San Francisco when she was 20.
The friend she went with ended up returning home after a few months, but my mom stayed.
Not sure I would have been so brave!

My mom gave us everything she had. Thankfully that included lots of laughter and smiles.

"Ask not what your mother can do for you. Ask what you can do for your mother!"

It was fun remembering her favorite things...
Come to think of it, we should have put "The Sound of Music" on there too!

Starting Over

Between the wall and the couch I’m sitting on are the picture boards from my mom’s funeral. There are three of them, each detailing a different era in her life. I haven’t looked at them since I brought them home in July, but I know they are back there, untouched but for some dust bunnies and wayward dog hair.

I thought about taking them out today. About showing the pictures, her story, to someone who has never met her. Thought maybe it would help me spend some time with her, remembering what a wonderful person she was. To talk about her and celebrate her life for a while.

But I didn’t.

Instead, I quickly redirected my thoughts to something more pragmatic. Molly and I really need to find the time to clean out her closet and dresser, to go through her jewelry and keepsakes. 

But really I’m in no rush. As long as most of her things are still in my parents’ house, there is some sense of her being there, I guess. Of everything, it’s her sock drawer that really sticks out in my mind. All paired up and ready to go.

Only they’re not going anywhere. 

Truth is, I don’t think I’ve been dealing with my mom’s death all that well. I haven’t cried much (save for my weekly hour of couch time) and I try not to think about her very often. Maybe I’m subconsciously afraid of how much it’s going to hurt, of admitting how much I’ve lost. Usually as soon I start thinking about her, I shift my focus to the things right in front me (chair, window, the ache in my low back) to get my mind in a safer place. I lie and say I'm being mindful of the present moment. But truthfully, I'm avoiding the present moment when I abandon my sadness and look for something else.

Not sure I’m ready to pull out the picture boards yet, but I did just reread the eulogy I gave at her funeral service. I’ll share it here. And maybe soon I can share those boards…

Back to the beginning and starting over, it seems. 

Mom's Eulogy

It’s nice to see so many people here. I see faces I’ve seen since the day I was born, lifelong friends and family that have been with my mom throughout her entire life. They knew her as a little daddy’s girl with curly red hair growing up on Fairmount Ave. in St. Paul, as a shy and skinny kid at St. Luke’s grade school and then at the Convent of the Visitation for high school.

I see the faces of people who met my mom as an adult, watched her marry and become a mother. I see women who learned how be wives and mothers alongside my mom, people that were close to our family through the various ups and downs of life.

She loved you all and there is nothing she would have liked more than to be celebrating her life each and every one of you. It’s a shame we don’t plan events like this for the living, but I know she’s here in spirit.

There are some of you here who never had the chance to meet my mom, but if you’re here because care about someone in her family, that means you care about her because everything good in us is a reflection of her. Pat’s wit and commitment, Billy classiness and love for tradition, Molly’s compassion and devotion to caring for others… my goofiness.

She was the number one fan of each of her four children. She was committed to her job as a stay-at-home mom and there was nothing she would have rather done. She was a volunteer, room mother, cook, nurse, and taxi driver. She was even a leprechaun once a year, secretly delivering a hat full of candy to each of our classrooms on St. Patrick’s Day. She never told us it was her, she just enjoyed hearing the kids and teachers talk about it and try to figure her out. It took us years to finally figure out it was her.      

She rarely missed a game for any of the dozens of sports we played from T-Ball to varsity sports. She drove my brothers to hockey games all over the state and even played in a mother-son game. She once got two cars stuck on our driveway hill before getting the third one out so I could go to basketball practice. She’d even agreed to let my push her in and adult jogger for part of a marathon relay this past May, but decided to sit out when her health got the best of her. I thought I was doing something for her by going on runs with her… but it really was the other way around.

When Molly was in the hospital after her snowmobile accident back in 1979, she was at her side every day. Getting kids to school, heading to downtown St. Paul, then coming home again to care for the other three when my dad arrived in early evening. When Molly came home, my mom took care of her with gentleness, patience, and a kind spirit that can sometimes be hard when caregiving. She had to manage one kid on the mend and three other ones who were taking liberty with their newfound freedoms. I’m sure it wasn’t easy, but she did it with the grace and style that was the hallmark of my mom. 

She was silly, goofy and loved watching us laugh. She did things like put a rubber band around the trigger of the kitchen sink hose so the next kid to turn on the sink got sprayed. She hauled us around in a big blue suburban and let us roll around in the back end while she swerved on country roads. When we were old enough (well, almost old enough), she let us try our hand at driving on those same roads.

We spent countless hours with her playing duets on the piano and lying in her bed watching The Carol Burnett Show, Dallas, Knots Landing, and Nightline with Ted Koppel. There was no place we’d rather be than snuggled up in her arms.

And yet she was the closest thing to a walking Emily Post Etiquette book you could find.  Short from citing the page number in the book, she knew the “proper” or “mannerly” way to handle most situations. And it was never about being “stuffy” or “putting on airs,” it was about respecting others and showing them you cared.  My brother Billy is no Emily Post, but boy did she love enjoying the finer things in life with him when she’d get to put those manners to good use.

But she wasn’t just a mom to us; she was a mom to so many more. On more than one occasion, she welcomed kids into our house (teenagers nonetheless!) whose families were going through hard times or had been relocated during high school. She mothered them like they were here own. That’s how it was with any of our friends that came into the house. Our house was a place kids knew they could come to be happy—and she made it that way. And with all she endured the past year, she still cared enough to ask about our childhood friends.

As adults she never stopped mothering us. She dropped cookies off to us at work, invited us down for coffee and doughnuts, and took us out to lunch whenever she had a chance. She visited and answered the phone at the family business just to be closer to my dad and siblings, often riding shotgun for a chance to catch up.

Being a mom wasn’t just a job, it was her passion.

But if there was one thing that my mom enjoyed more than being a mom, it was being a grandma. The other day Pat was talking about my mom’s “mystery date” to Build-a-Bear Workshop with the first three grandkids. She had fun taking them out, but more than anything she just loved having her grandchildren around, and doted on them whenever she had a chance… taping their pictures and handmade cards everywhere in the house. She loved watching her children care for their children… perhaps she saw her young self in us returning the favor to the next generation.

My mom was also a committed wife. One month before she died she celebrated her 50^th wedding anniversary with my dad. They were pretty funny near the end of her life, getting on each other’s nerves now and again with a playful spirit that kept each other in check. Just two days before she died I was snuggled up with her in bed and she asked me to get my dad. She wanted a hug. And I heard her thank him for a good life together.

Of course at least half of that good life was her doing. She cared for him in every way possible. And for the most part, she did it without complaint but with desire. She was a hunting and fishing widow many weekends of the year, always happy to see my dad return.  I’ll assume it was because she missed him, but my guess is that sometimes it was the joy of knowing that reinforcements had arrived and her weekend of being terrorized by 4 kids was over.

She had a strong, quiet faith. She was at church every Sunday and Holy Day throughout her life, even had some God-sent radar that knew when as teenagers my brothers decided that “going to church” meant just swinging in to pick up the bulletin. She felt closest to God when she was visiting the nuns at Visitation. Molly and I used to talk about what a good nun she’d make.

Our hearts are broken this week and while we’re all sad she’s gone from us, I know she’s here celebrating somehow… and will be waiting for us all at a picnic table just inside the gates of heaven—with cold milk and warm cookies straight from the oven.

What Goes Through Your Head?

“When you see a friend for the first time since your mom died what goes through your head?” A friend, who lost her mom just a month before me, sent me that question in an e-mail last week. I think I’ve finally come up with my answer...

I wonder if they know.

Do they have any idea how completely different I am? Do they know about the metamorphosis that has taken—is taking—place inside me? Can they tell how I have been forever scarred? That in some ways I’m as weak as I was the moment I heard, “she’s gone,” but I also have the strength of her life within me? That the scar, while painful and fragile, is doing something to the rest of me? Making me hardened, wise and a thousand times more compassionate all at once? Do they know how confusing it is to be torn apart, to be a child and a wise elder at that same time?

Then, I wonder if they Know.

Do they know this feeling? Do they Know, with a captial "K"? Am I standing with someone who has felt this same tug of emotions? Has their heart been ripped in this same way? Have they made it through to some “other side” in their grief? Is that even possible? Is this someone who, with just a nod and wink, could make me feel understood? Whose words are completely unnecessary? Someone who will make me feel wrapped in love because just by having stood in my shoes I know they have no choice but to hold me in their heart? To keep me from feeling completely alone?

So I guess it’s a two-part answer, my friend…

My thoughts first go inside, to me… “Can’t you see how changed I am? I’m a totally different person now. Nothing is the same for me. It will never be the same for me.”

Then my thoughts move to you, the friend standing before me… “Do you know this pain? Have you experienced this life-changing, and completely human experience? Are you different, too? Are you and I the ‘same’?”

I have a feeling this response will fade over time, but in some way I know it will be there forever. You and I, we'll continue to miss our loved ones, but if we stay connected with those who remain, we'll be stronger. We'll give peace to those newly (and begrudgingly) entering the group of Knowers. 

Peace, sister.

Hearing Her Voice

A while back, while running in the rain, my iPhone died. I had saved a number of phone messages from my mom on it, calls from before she was too weak to call me. Of course I hadn't backed up my messages so losing that phone broke my heart. I knew what I'd lost.

My mom was still alive and the phone replaced when that iPhone came back to life beneath a thick covering of rice. Closer to being a motherless daughter, I knew what I'd found.

This weekend I listened to those messages. I sat on the corner of the couch, knees pulled up to my chest, and cried as I listened to my mom speak. To me. One after another, messages spanning the course of two years. She had a cold, she was going to the dentist, she'd left the key in the garage, would I come by and help her with something... Small ordinary moments in life that now take on more significance than ever. Did I return the call? Did I stop by? Did I tell her to feel better? I hope so.

I'll probably never delete those messages from my cell phone. I love hearing her voice. It's better than the videos I have of her, because here she's talking to me.

She knew I loved her, but I wish I could tell her, better yet show her, just one more time. A quick call to check-in, a visit to help her find a lost purse... whatever it was. A gentle reminder of how important it is to demonstrate our love for others. Every day.

That First Mourning

Early morning phone calls are never a good thing. And the one I got about two months ago was no exception. My husband picked up the phone before me, but I got on the line just in time to hear my dad say that I needed to get to my parents’ house as soon as possible. He said, in a broken voice, that my mom was dying.

I didn’t really believe it. I mean, I knew she was in the “process of dying,” something my new hospice buddies said could take up to six months. Mom was only on hospice for a little over a week, so I was pretty sure my dad was overreacting.

And yet I jumped out of bed, got dressed and ran out the door in less than five minutes. I figured we’d at least have the day together. That I could crawl into her hospital bed one last time, put my head on her shoulder and feel her warmth next to me.

Maybe the rest of the world was on fast forward or perhaps I was moving in slow motion, but as I drove to their house I was acutely aware of cars speeding past me. I didn’t want to get pulled over on the way to see my dying mother, so I made an effort to drive the speed limit. Besides, she wasn’t really going to die anyway; I had no real need to speed. She’d wait for me.

Only she didn’t.

Like most things in life, my mom’s death didn’t go according to plan. My plan. She took her last breath just a minute before I walked in the door. As soon as I saw her, I knew she was gone. Her eyes were closed, her mouth was open, and all of the color had left her face. But I still ran to her, unwilling to let my heart believe that of which my brain was certain. I ignored my sister and my dad crying on the other side of the bed. I even got a little angry with them for giving up on her, for saying “she’s gone.” I checked for her pulse and listened for her breath.

Nothing.

The small room where she lived out her last few months suddenly felt very, very big and very, very empty. I immediately become aware of deep aloneness that I imagine I’m going to live with for the rest of my life. It began as an ache in my chest that I can still feel, just takes letting my guard down for a brief moment. Something I still find difficult to do.

After my dad and sister left the room, I crawled in bed with my mom one last time. There, alone with my mom’s body, I closed my eyes so that I could remember the feel of her next to me. I’d done this many times before in the recent past, a constant effort to burn the sensation into my brain. To remember how she felt, her physical presence. But this time I could feel that she was losing her warmth, had taken it with her in death.

I’m not sure how long I lay in bed with her, but when I finally got up I felt bad leaving the room. She looked so lonely lying there, an embodiment of what I was feeling on the inside. I knew the clock was ticking, that soon her body would be swept away and forever changed—things taken out, things put in. To leave her would be to squander the last few moments I could ever have with my mom alone, even if I knew she wasn’t really there.

Eventually they came for her. A kind, but awkward conversation at the door followed by what seemed like a friendly "introduction" to my mom. I left the room and it felt like I was giving her away. Giving her to someone I hardly new myself. It wasn't long before they brought her out. Seeing my mom covered in a white sheet, I felt a small part of me die. As they approached the door, I realized it was the last time I'd be with her as a complete person. My whole mom. Just a few feet away but beyond my reach forever.