One Year

It seems like just yesterday and a long time ago that my Mom died. Even going through and looking at these pictures I sit back and smile at the memories I have locked away. The first picture is where Dan and I were visiting Mom in the hospital during one of her first stays there. The second is after I gave my Mom a very ugly picture of me with the same facial expression I've got. The picture below is where the girls made a wonderful scrapbook for my Mom of her whole life and my brothers and I posed with her as if it were ours. The "rabbit ears" is such a great example of how much fun my Mom was and how as much as she would roll her eyes at our sense of humor, she still got it and was the source of some it. The rabbit fur jacket goes back almost thirty years when her and Susan had these matching jackets. She still was willing to laugh at her self. The Christmas picture is such a great example of how important traditions were to my Mom. During every get together, she would make sure we got some kind of picture showing the progression of the family, always one with the grandkids. She had no shame in getting a picture. She would bribe, but never raise her voice at the grandkids, no matter how obtuse they were being.

We talk about my Mom all the time. The sharpest pain is gone, focused mostly with great memories, but I miss her a ton. We talk a lot about what Mom would think of a given situation or how much she would enjoy a certain food. My heart is heavy today thinking back to last year, in the last week with my Mom. I video-taped my Mom telling stories and my Mom spending the last days talking to each of her kids, grandkids and friends as she said goodbye. Even a year later, I haven't been able to bring myself around to watching the video.