This is my mom:
This is my mom shortly before she found out she had cancer. I really love this woman. I am sure that we have known each other in different times and places. Our relationship surpasses this life.
And so, I am shaken by this looming mortality. I am sick to my stomach with it!
I wanted to get that out of the way. Inevitably, it will impact every single perspective I share.
Since Mom started chemo we've all been walking on egg shells. I think the first one must've been the worst! Poor Mom, under the microscope. We all wondered what to expect. My worst fear, that she would wilt before my eyes. Like a perfect lily folding up on my kitchen table. Some mysterious force speeding her away from me. And, like that lily, I know I would have no right to keep her here. Because she is not exclusively mine. She belongs to the earth and the universe and it can claim her whenever it pleases.
I remember when Mom asked me if I was scared that she would die. And I really thought before I answered her. “No, I'm not worried that you will die. I've known that truth since I was a child and faced it already. No, I am afraid that you will suffer”. She laid my fears to rest, like only a mother could, when I woke, the day after her first chemo, to find her wandering about watering the garden.
I feel better now. I love that Mom does nothing lightly.
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