Memories of my mother

After a conversation with an old friend yesterday, I began to think about my mother. I lost my mom in 2002 to complications from Multiple Sclerosis, or at least that was the diagnosis that had been given to her in 1990. She had suffered from this horrific disease for 23 years. It was a few years back during a conversation with another friend who has a vast medical background that I realized that my mother probably had Guillain Barre syndrome. Whatever the name, it was not a pleasant disease.

When I think about my mom, I truly cannot remember a time when she did not have a smile on her face. She was unique in that she very rarely met someone that she did not like.

My mom did not have the easiest of lives either. She was raised by a single mom, and during the 1930's and 1940's, this was extremely uncommon. She never knew her father and that ate at her soul her entire life. The one thing that she wanted more than anything else in life was to meet her father, not a lot to ask for if you think about it. She came very close to meeting him when I was just a baby, but somehow that meeting fell through. Growing up when she would talk about him, that was when I would see great sadness in her eyes.

My parents moved to Lawson when I was 13 years old. I never saw my mom happier than when she lived in that tiny little one stop sign town. She loved Lawson, with all of her heart. After I graduated and left home, she ran for Mayor. She was elected as the first female Mayor of Lawson, and she took great pride in that. She worked extremely hard for the residents and the town. This, as I look back, was the peak of my mother's life, she was the happiest and most fulfilled during that time period.

My last conversation with her was on a Sunday afternoon. I would usually call her twice a week on Sundays and Wednesdays. That following Wednesday I was busy working on a garden and thought I was too tired and would wait to call her the next day. I received a phone call the next evening from the Ray County Coroner, telling me that my mother had died. My world collapsed at that time.

Eight years have passed since I buried my mom, and I can now look back and often smile. But,  very rarely a day goes by when she is not in my thoughts. What I would not give for one last conversation, one last hug, one last cup of coffee at the kitchen table. So, if you're reading this, my one piece of advice is this; to acknowledge, appreciate and validate those in your life that you love and care about. You never know what tomorrow might bring.