My Life as a COMMA!

Mom and Muffin

This is my mom.  Well, actually it is Mom and Muffin.  This picture was taken on Christmas morning, 1996.  This is 4 months past when the doctors had given mom to live.  She was a fighter.

This picture shows the spirit of mom I think I remember the most.  She had an indominable spirit.  No matter what was going on around her……most would never know it.  She always made the best of things and went on with life.  Yesterday was her birthday.  She would have been 64.  She had this indominable spirit up until the day she died.  I think that is where I get some of it…….

As I sat at my computer last night….I just couldn’t do it.  I couldn’t bring myself to write.  I miss her terribly.  It isn’t like we had the best relationship in the world.  We definitely didn’t.  But there was something about mom……something that made me call her every day to just say hello.  Something that made me want to make her proud.  I still do.  I still think about what I am doing and who I am becoming and wonder what she would think….if she would be proud.

She was a fighter.  She went to work up until almost three weeks before she died.  She once told me….”I don’t want to hear you complain about this any more.  It isn’t that I don’t love you, it is just time for you to make a decision one way or another and then live with it.  Don’t sit here wishing this or wishing that.  You take action.”  And that is how she was.  She took action.  She would let you know what she thought and what she was going to do about it.

I loved my mother.  Still do.  But I also remember that when I had Breanna it totally scared me.  Mom didn’t have a good relationship with her mother.  And mom and I didn’t have the best relationship when I was growing up either.  But I loved her and so wanted her approval.  I think I learned a lot from her about raising my daughter.  A lot of what to do as much as what not to do.

I realize how much her approval meant to me.  I was constantly seeking it.  And sometimes when I didn’t feel I had her approval….I always knew I had her love.  It was towards the end of her life that she and I were finally able to come to terms with our relationship.  We would just sit and talk….about nothing or really important things.  We had finally realized that even though we weren’t on the same page…..it was ok.  We talked about the difficult things.  I will never forget getting the call from her that her cancer had moved to her brain.  She called and wanted to tell me herself.  Then….she called me again.  This time she asked me to come see her and bring some paper.  You see, mom knew she was on “borrowed time” and that she didn’t have much longer to live.  She told me that my father was not ready to discuss it but that she wanted to discuss the funeral.  She apologized because this was only less than four months since I had planned my children’s funeral…but she needed my help.  She wanted to make sure we knew what she wanted and who she wanted and the music she wanted.  She wanted to lift that burden from us.  She was being selfless……thinking of us.  So we did just that.  I told her that I would keep the paper and bring it out and show dad when he was ready.  We talked about everything.  Her view of God and heaven.  It is a conversation I will never forget.  I can honestly say I know my mother not only approved of me and my life….but loved me.  I am thankful for that.

As I am struggling through parts of my life now….I often think of her.  I hear her words telling me to take action.  Today…..I feel I have done a little too much.  I am feeling overstretched and not quite where I need to be.  I just came from a conversation of a friend and she counseled me to say that sometimes if we are doing something that isn’t glorifying God….we need to step away.  I am there.  I need to take action.  But I believe some of my actions are to start saying no so that I can say yes to the right things.

I came home and read this short devotional before writing this.

God can do anything.  NOthing is impossible for Him.  But that doesn’t mean He will choose to do everything possible.  He does His will.  So when you are praying for the impossible, it doesn’t mean He will do it.  He may.  Or He may not.  But praising Him invites Him to do what He wants in your life, which is always greater than anything we can imagine anyway.

God mended my broken relationship with my mother.  I praise Him for that.  And although He could have chosen to heal her and allow her to be here with me now….that wasn’t His plan for her life…..or mine.  So I will praise Him for what  He did for both of us while she was still here….and for what He is doing in my life now…since she has been gone.

I love you, momma.  You inspire me still.  Your words ring in my heart and your love carries me.  I hope you are walking with the angels…..with my babies…..and your loved ones…….and looking down on us and being very proud.

til we meet again ~c