Notes: I Remember Mama

If you haven’t read the play, “I Remember Mama,” I highly recommend it.

Mama.

I had a seemingly ordinary childhood. Four older siblings. Two loving parents who worked hard to provide for us. A roof over my head. Food on the table. Picnics. Cookouts. Hiking. Siblings. (My two favorite memories of them are the time when I “accidentally” taped the cats mouth shut and my brother – my Priest – had to help get it off of the poor thing [in my defense I was 5 years old], and when my middle sister, Lisa, made me so mad I ran away from home, with an empty suitcase, which earned me a fried chicken dinner from my mom, as she knew that would always bring me home, even at the age of 7.)

My earliest memories are from the farm in Illinois. It was a wonderful place to grown up. Lots of room to run and play. Gardening. Exploring. Ice Skating in the winter on the frozen pond…  I love that we always had family dinner together, at the table. Mama cooked. Wow, could Mama cook. She was amazing. I miss her pies and her rhubarb torte, which was my request for my birthday once I reached high school. When I was young my mom made amazing cakes. One year she made me a huge alligator cake. This was before TV Food Network, Cake Blogs or specialty shops. She figured it out and created those cakes from love. I continued this tradition with my own children, because of Mama.

I grew up and left for college. Met a boy, fell in love and Mama helped plan my wedding. Then my babies came. Mama helped then, too. When Victoria was just a newborn she was very sick and Mama flew to Michigan to help me out. (My Rock arranged that, by the way, without my knowledge. I still remember my absolute RELIEF when I saw Mama walking through my front door.)

My babies grew. Life was pretty close to perfect. Then March 2006 happened. Cancer happened. Mama and Daddy came. They moved in and took care of my family for months. Mama made breakfast for Victoria and Matthew. She did the laundry, cooking, cleaning… she ran my home when I could not. Every afternoon she would drive to the hospital to spend time with me. (Daddy came every day before morning rounds and stayed all day until Dennis could come up.)

One day when Mama was ironing clothes she accidentally dropped the iron and it burned a perfect iron shape into the rug. When I came home from the hospital she was so apologetic. I didn’t see a burn. I saw love.

I miss that iron shape in the carpet.

A few years later we moved to Colorado. Mama loved it there. She spent her 80th birthday there. She loved the Air Force Base in Colorado Springs. She loved Pike’s Peak. She loved the Garden of the Gods. I love all of those places, too. Our greatest shared love of Colorado was for Georgetown. We visited there often. High Tea in the Tea Room. Sour Cream Ice Cream from the candy shop. Riding the Georgetown Railway. Eating amazing burgers and sweet potato fries at Ed’s.

May I say that Mama went to Pike’s Peak via the Cog Railroad and via my driving up to the peak. Hands down that drive was the scariest thing I have ever done. Truth.

We moved to South Carolina the year Mama died. She never saw my home. We never explored this city together.

My Mama had survived being hit by a car – not while she was in a car, but when she was a pedestrian. The car was going about 40 mph. My Mama lived with blindness and hearing loss. If you had met her you would never know any of this unless she shared it. She was joyful. She warmly opened her home to anyone. She loved going to church. She loved playing cards. She loved watching TV Food Network. She loved her grandchildren. She loved her children. Most of all she loved her husband.

I had the extraordinary honor of visiting Mama twice in the 6 weeks that she was ill. Once in the ICU and once in the Hospice facility. The cancer had eaten away at her bones. Her breathing was difficult. When I would spend the night with her she would always ask about her husband and children. It didn’t matter it if was 2 am or 2 pm. She checked on her loved ones first. Now, after that she would talk my ear off. Once I had to ask if she would mind if we took a 30 minute nap. Mama’s memory was always strong.

Daddy celebrated his birthday when Mama was in hospice. She determined to make it a good day for him. She asked me to buy him a gift. She prayed for a good day that day. It was an amazing day. She was alert for most of the day. She was surrounded by her children. She had her husband, as always, right by her side. We laughed. We talked. We took lots of pictures.

Saying goodbye to Mama in hospice was overwhelmingly painful. Sorrowful. We knew it was the last time we would see each other. My next trip home would be for her funeral. Anguish. Anguish is the word that fits best. Sitting at the airport gate I happened across this, and it was perfect:

I miss Mama. I miss mom. I miss the amazing lady of Dorothy Sanders.

The year after Mama died I went back to Colorado on a solo trip. I visited Georgetown looking forward to the places Mama and I loved. Ed’s was no longer in existence. The candy shop didn’t have any sour cream ice cream. The Tea Room wasn’t serving high tea that day. So, I did what any adult would do, I sat outside of the candy shop and cried. I was alone. I missed Mama terribly. My heart felt like it was breaking all over again.

We never get over loss. It doesn’t get better or easier. Personally, I think we absorb it as part of the ever-changing “new normal.” Some days the loss seems fresh, like it just happened. In those times, it IS like it just happened. Some days the loss hovers like the Uninvited Guest.

This story, found on The Little Things website, explains it best:

“I wish I could say you get used to people dying. I never did. I don’t want to. It tears a hole through me whenever somebody I love dies, no matter the circumstances. But I don’t want it to ‘not matter.’ I don’t want it to be something that just passes. My scars are a testament to the love and the relationship that I had for and with that person. And if the scar is deep, so was the love. So be it.

Scars are a testament to life. Scars are a testament that I can love deeply and live deeply and be cut, or even gouged, and that I can heal and continue to live and continue to love. And the scar tissue is stronger than the original flesh ever was. Scars are a testament to life. Scars are only ugly to people who can’t see.

As for grief, you’ll find it comes in waves. When the ship is first wrecked, you’re drowning, with wreckage all around you. Everything floating around you reminds you of the beauty and the magnificence of the ship that was, and is no more. And all you can do is float. You find some piece of the wreckage and you hang on for a while. Maybe it’s some physical thing. Maybe it’s a happy memory or a photograph.
Maybe it’s a person who is also floating. For a while, all you can do is float. Stay alive.

In the beginning, the waves are 100 feet tall and crash over you without mercy. They come 10 seconds apart and don’t even give you time to catch your breath. All you can do is hang on and float. After a while, maybe weeks, maybe months, you’ll find the waves are still 100 feet tall, but they come further apart. When they come, they still crash all over you and wipe you out.

But in between, you can breathe, you can function. You never know what’s going to trigger the grief. It might be a song, a picture, a street intersection, the smell of a cup of coffee. It can be just about anything…and the wave comes crashing. But in between waves, there is life.

Somewhere down the line, and it’s different for everybody, you find that the waves are only 80 feet tall. Or 50 feet tall. And while they still come, they come further apart. You can see them coming. An anniversary, a birthday, or Christmas, or landing at O’Hare. You can see it coming, for the most part, and prepare yourself.

And when it washes over you, you know that somehow you will, again, come out the other side. Soaking wet, sputtering, still hanging on to some tiny piece of the wreckage, but you’ll come out.

Take it from an old guy. The waves never stop coming, and somehow you don’t really want them to. But you learn that you’ll survive them. And other waves will come. And you’ll survive them too. If you’re lucky, you’ll have lots of scars from lots of loves. And lots of shipwrecks.”

My seemingly ordinary childhood was extraordinary. Mama ensured that somewhere along the way. I will always remember Mama.