a balloon for my mom on mother's day

My sister is very sentimental and her emotions run deeper than a lot of people know...that is why I love her - or at least one of the reasons. Today on mother's day she sent a balloon up to heaven to my mom with a note on it - only she knows what the note said. She emailed me this picture of the balloon on it's way and it made me teary.

I actually thought year 2 without a mom on mother's day would be easier and in some ways it is. I thought I was doing really well until, when I was buying something at a store, the clerk said "Are you ready for mother's day?". She was just being nice, but I replied. "I don't have a mom". She looked stricken, so I said "but it is easier this year". She still looked like she needed something else so I said, "I am a mom though!". None of it worked and I bet she will never say that to anyone else. I felt bad for making her feel bad. I didn't mean to. This year all of the mother's day sales, cards, etc didn't bother me as much. Of course I missed my mom and always will but this year it was better.

I miss my mother in law too. The picture above is her in 1948, when she was 24 years old. Look at the legs of both my mom and my mom in law! My kids were doubly blessed to come from a long line of great legs and a love for Mary Jane shoes (well, I haven't seen Dan and Bill wearing Mary Janes yet). Jeanne is still here but she has lost all of her memories. She sits in a nursing home in Wisconsin stringing words together in no particular order. They march out of her mouth randomly but the rhythm is way off. Maybe they make sense to her. She doesn't know her own children or her husband (who is also in a nursing home but a different one). This final stage of her disease is probably easier on her because she doesn't know that she doesn't remember. It is harder on her family though - her children. It was hard when Bruce went to visit her when she still lived at home and she knew what she was losing. Bruce overheard her asking his dad "Who is that young man staying in the back bedroom". She later said to Bruce "Why didn't you tell me you were my son". How horrible for her it must have been to know she had forgotten something so important? And how sad for her son, my sweet husband. I learned a lot from her - how to fold shirts, not to put fabric softener in with the towels, and to enjoy walking in a good blizzard.

I miss buying my mom a "duster" or house dress, as she had taken to wearing the last several years of her life. Or I would send her money to spend at the casino. Whatever I sent her, it was always late but she came to expect that. For Jeanne I usually found a pretty owl (she collected them) or maybe a nice pair of pants and matching top. I ended up getting her pajamas the last few times I got her something. I feel badly for not sending her things any more but it seems pointless because to her they are meaningless. And I know that she knew we loved her and that somewhere in there she still knows that. In the end, for all of us, things have no meaning - but the love of our family does.

When I look at these two pictures of my mom and my mom in law when they were young and beautiful, I think of how neither of them knew what was in store for them. It's a lucky thing none of one of us know what awaits us. Some things we can control but many others we cannot. I also think from their smiles that if asked, they both would say they had a good life - even if it was hard at times, which I know, for both of them it was. I wish that I could just really live in the moment and enjoy every day. No one can even though every self help book tells us this. Every moment should be the best.

I hope my mom gets her balloon and her note from Barbara. When Jeanne gets up there someday, I hope someone hands her all of her memories back in a pretty package. I can only be grateful to have had these wonderful, strong women in my life for as long as I did.