8 long months

It has been 8 long months since Momma passed away.  Sometimes, it seems like yesterday that she was here with me, sitting next to me, smiling for me, but others is seems like forever.  This last year has been a pretty bad year, with Momma slowly going away from me to her going to Heaven without me.  I am thankful that I am living in our house though and I have lots of pictures to look at and they make me smile. I also have fun memories that I wish my brothers had.  They didn't see her too much the last 10 years of her life, really especially the last 5 but I did.  I have the day to day memories that they don't have too.  Yet, I would do almost anything to have her still with me, even with the Alzheimer's.  Not a day goes by that I don't think about her either.  My favorite month of the year was October, but now I hate it since that is the month she passed away.  I didn't know it was possible to miss someone so much!  I feel like I miss her twice over, once for the mother she was before Alzheimer's and the other for the mother she became with Alzheimer's.  I miss them both.

Today is the type of day that we would go for a scooter.  Mom would walk beside me and I would ride my little scooter.  We would go for a couple of miles then come home.  She loved the sunshine!  If the sun was shining, so was she.  She loved to work in the garden.  When I was younger she made these homemade knee pads to work in the garden.  I have a funny picture of her wearing them.  I used to tease her so much about them that she threatened to make me a pair.  I just laughed.  Momma knew I did not like working in the garden, especially weeding.  That was my punishment when I was small besides sitting on a chair and thinking about whatever I did wrong.  Momma would say do you want to do some weeding?  That usually straightened me right up!  I think Mom and I had a lot in common.  We both liked musicals, sewing, the same movies, the same cartoons, the same love for almost anything Disney (although she loved Donald best and I love Winnie the Pooh best).  We just had a lot in common.  I remember when she would ask who wanted to go with her to the store (like we really had a choice, but it felt so nice to think we did!) and my brothers and I would come running with I do, I do's!  You never knew what going out would bring.  Sometimes it was just a trip to the store but other times it would be a surprise to a movie or a park or something fun.  With Momma, you just never knew.  That was the kind of mom I would have liked to be.  I am that way being an aunt though and that is good enough now.  Mom loved to take us camping too, in a tent.  Yes, it is hard to imagine but the I hate to get dirty girl (me!) loved camping.  I loved helping to put up a tent and to make the campfire.  I just loved camping with Mom.  One time we took my cousins Samantha and Justice camping with my friend Laura too.  It was just so much fun.  I had a beautiful big 12 X 9 cabin type tent that was perfect for us.  One summer we even lived in a tent, well 2, one for sleeping and one for the kitchen while Mom worked at the summer camp.  It was a good time.  Mom never let us know how hard that summer was for her.  She made it fun for us so we wouldn't miss our Dad who decided he no longer wanted to be a husband or a dad.  She made the transition to one parent for us easy.  Momma would talk to us about it and we became a team.  That was her word for it, we were a team and teams stick together.  Now I think about how I made Mom and I become a team when she started to get sick and needed more help.  I just did what she did.  I helped her but I truly hope that I made her feel important.  I still spoke to her with important things, I knew she wouldn't remember, but I wanted to include her.  She still had opinions even until the very end.  She may not remember from one minute to the other, but underneath she was still Momma.

Here are some pictures:

The top one is of Momma, Andrew, and I in Algonquin park in Ontario in 1974.  I was 6 and Andrew was 5.  The bottom one is from Kathy's Wedding in November 1996.  I was one of the maid of honors.  One of the best days for Momma and me.  Kathy getting married.  I was so excited about that.

I do hope this finds you doing well and in less pain if you have any!  Despite it being a sad day, I am doing okay.  The pain isn't too bad for a change (at least so far!) and I have a lesson to look forward to in about 20 minutes!