Wednesday, January 2, 2013

still my mother

"Do you know what building we are in?' my mother asks.
"It's our home Mom," I gently say. "It's our home here in Aldergrove."
We speak of winter weather then and Christmas recently enjoyed, although she has no memory of it.
"I wonder how my mother is doing," my mother muses. "Do you know where she is now?"
Her mother, my grandmother, has been gone for twenty years. She would be one hundred and fourteen this year if she were still living.
A few minutes later, she asks again about her mother, our previous conversation wiped from her memory. She wonders aloud about her father, gone for fifty years, and my father, gone for two.
There are tears as grief is revisited.
We recall with thankfulness together my father's life well lived.
This is one of her 'bad' days. I can almost tell by looking at her face whether she is having a good or bad day with memory.
She is living in the moment now, unable to either remember or think ahead.
It is surprising to me how well one can live with both memory and anticipation stripped away.
The dailiness of life then becomes a boon.
There are still gifts, still lessons passed along.
She is still my mother.

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