Two weeks from today, on September 22nd, will mark one year since my mother died. My siblings have been emailing about commemorating the date. I miss her every day -- what’s so special about the day she died? Commemorating, remembering, honoring the dead - my first impulse is that we should, yes, set aside time to attentively, actively, remember the loved ones we miss so much. I’ve always liked the idea of the Day of the Dead (All Saints’ Day), where all the ancestors are remembered and celebrated around the whole country. In America, we have Memorial Day (with way too much of the red-white-and-blue patriotic inspiration for the next generation) and Veteran’s Day (which is supposed to honor the survivors). But, the poems in the newspaper about how much “we still miss your smile” that start with “When God called you Home…,” give me the creeps. It seems to me, with a second thought, that commemoration of a death-day, as opposed to a birth-day, is in fact recognizing the day that your grief began. That’s selfish, and very disconnected from honoring the person who died. The national holiday is on Martin Luther King, Jr.’s, birth-day, not the day he was killed -- so that we can spend the day thinking, “Thank God someone like that was born unto us.”
I spent Mom’s dying days at her bedside in a life-changing experience of intimacy with her and with my siblings, and renewed spiritual energy. One of the many things I pondered as I sat there with her, was how she influenced me and how much of who I am today is to be credited to her. If you like me, you have to thank my mom! She spent many years, I know now, trying to balance both her need to explore her options and to fulfill her familial duties, and she spent the last two decades being - finally - the person she always wanted to be: living in exotic places providing needed education and healthcare services, acting out her principles of thinking globally and acting locally. At her deathbed, I promised myself to become more authentic, and as much as allowed by personality and circumstances, more like her. September 22nd is actually my anniversary, where I mark my progress toward my life goals.
I do, and have done, and will continue to, commemorate her life. In the last week, I have harvested edible vegetables from the raised, wire-bottomed beds that her last monetary gift purchased. I moved her garden bench to a new-made spot under the shade of the maple tree, hug the blue-painted pvc bird feeder, and straightened the picket fence bits that I took from her yard (I want my garden to be recognizable to her spirit as well as inviting). I made pickles, dilly beans, and, as I promised in my eulogy, watermelon rind pickles! I traveled this weekend 100 miles to her sister’s 80th birthday party. I re-filled the bird feeders in my yard, and I will, today, order a few more fruit bushes, and more spring bulbs. And I talked about her, with a smile, a laugh, or an affirmative nod, to friends and family. I think of her every day. I commemorate her every day.
I spent Mom’s dying days at her bedside in a life-changing experience of intimacy with her and with my siblings, and renewed spiritual energy. One of the many things I pondered as I sat there with her, was how she influenced me and how much of who I am today is to be credited to her. If you like me, you have to thank my mom! She spent many years, I know now, trying to balance both her need to explore her options and to fulfill her familial duties, and she spent the last two decades being - finally - the person she always wanted to be: living in exotic places providing needed education and healthcare services, acting out her principles of thinking globally and acting locally. At her deathbed, I promised myself to become more authentic, and as much as allowed by personality and circumstances, more like her. September 22nd is actually my anniversary, where I mark my progress toward my life goals.
I do, and have done, and will continue to, commemorate her life. In the last week, I have harvested edible vegetables from the raised, wire-bottomed beds that her last monetary gift purchased. I moved her garden bench to a new-made spot under the shade of the maple tree, hug the blue-painted pvc bird feeder, and straightened the picket fence bits that I took from her yard (I want my garden to be recognizable to her spirit as well as inviting). I made pickles, dilly beans, and, as I promised in my eulogy, watermelon rind pickles! I traveled this weekend 100 miles to her sister’s 80th birthday party. I re-filled the bird feeders in my yard, and I will, today, order a few more fruit bushes, and more spring bulbs. And I talked about her, with a smile, a laugh, or an affirmative nod, to friends and family. I think of her every day. I commemorate her every day.
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