Mom

Twenty eight years ago yesterday my mother died.

I kept her wool plaid skirt and would press my nose up against it in my closet, afraid that when her signature scent was gone so would be my last little tie to her.

Ours was not an easy relationship.  We were both passionate people with definite ideas, but I loved her and for five years I was caught up in the deepest mourning I have ever known.

No one could replace Mom.  If I was sick I dreamed she came to me.  When I had something joyful to share, I picked up the phone to call her long past when that was possible.  I continued to judge myself by her standards for many years.

She died relatively young and looking back I realize that was both a tragedy and a gift, because I don't believe I truly felt free to be myself while she was alive.  I lived my life trying to please her when I should have been more focused on my own life.

That's the problem with living.  We are always so young, so inexperienced.  Even now at 64  I sometimes wonder what the parameters are for being me at this age.

Mom was a paragon of living.  Not always right, often painfully emotional, but very much alive and involved and my memories of her are, not to be her, or copy her, or be the opposite of her, but just to know that she did the best she could.

Perhaps that is the best legacy of all.