Maybe, as one gets older, Mothers’ Days become more important. Granted, it is a high-water “holiday” for greeting card companies, candy makers and florists. But, it gains in importance when those special moms are gone.
My office scheduler had a baby boy, so I was able to hold and hug the little guy and enjoy the wonderful feeling and smell of a new, little life. I was sure that things would be hopping in his household for Mother’ Day.
Then, one of my legislative friends, Rep. Lovanna “Lou” Jones passed away. I was part of her eulogy at church yesterday. Every year she held a Mother’s Day event for all the moms and grandmoms in her Chicago district, and I was invited because she knew that my son and daughter-in-law were far away at Ft. Lewis, Wash.
She was always worried that I might be alone on Mother’s Day, so she made sure that I had a place to go. She was a wonderful woman who, due to the death of her own daughter, wound up rearing seven grandchildren, a daughter-in-law’s child and even a kid from the neighborhood. She had a great heart, and it never beat more soundly than on Mother’s Day. I missed not having her around on this special day.
I went to Woodlawn Cemetery to visit my mother and my “Babi’s” graves. Lots of people were visiting their moms as well.
I thought of all the things we had not spoken in spite of speaking daily. All the things I would never know about them or their lives and times which we never broached.
It seemed, at the time when they were present, that we spent much time together. Yet, now, there are so many gaps which will never be filled.
When one is an only child, parents and grandparents are very close. When they are gone, there is a vacuum which is never filled again. I miss them.
I wondered about all the other folks at the cemetery and whether they, too, were thinking of times which could have been, but for which there had not been time. We really should take as much time as possible for our families, because the time we have together is so very short.
I saw a woman at Walgreen’s buying Mother’s Day cards, and my mind played a trick by thinking that I had better not be late in buying mine. Then, I quickly remembered that I would have no mom to buy for. It was sad.
I went out to dinner with a gentleman and his son who were missing their wife and mom, who had passed away some years earlier. They, too, wanted to recall great times with her. It was so nice to hear them speak so lovingly of their mother and what she had meant to them. The young man cited what he felt were his virtues, all generated and taught by his mom.
On Mother’s Day itself, I went to a play and dinner with my chief of staff. Her mother is sick and dying, and she is trying not to think about it. It was good to be there with her and for her, as she contemplates a future without her mom.
And, finally, came the piece de resistance, a constituent letter from a family whose mom had passed away earlier in the year and in whose funerary services I had participated.
She was a grand lady who knew I would always be alone on Mother’s Day short of someone going out with me. To that end, she would bake me a pineapple upside-down cake, my favorite, so I would have something special on a mom’s special day.
The daughter recounted the close family ties, noting that they would now go beyond her mom and bind us all together, no matter what. It was written in such a way that one could only get a bit teary-eyed.
So, to all the moms, who hopefully had a very special Mother’s Day?”yes, we are forever changed by what motherhood brings us. I am firmly convinced that from prehistoric times to today, there is nothing like a mother.
For all who still have theirs, enjoy every moment you can with your mom, as no one will ever love you more.
