The Never Ending

I never celebrated St. Patrick's Day much...wear green, say 'Top of the Morning' that type of thing. But fourteen years ago whatever celebration I had for that day really ended because I lost my mother on St. Patrick's day.

Since that time, I have moved from the day being one of sadness to going back to my traditional non-celebration of the day - though I am not wearing green today. I don't have a lot of green clothes and I am just lazy enough not to go looking for them. But I have a Celtic Sun Catcher so I'm feeling pretty Erin Go Bragh.
Instead, this day has come to symbolize the beginning of that never ending circle that is the relationship with my mother. At her death, we were close so we always be close.

She will always be that mother insisted we not change our plans to pay homage to her illness but keep on doing what we needed to do to pay homage to our faith that everything would happen that was supposed to happen when it was supposed to happen. So as I continue on I'm not really without her - she's behind me and because I am a woman of faith - she's ahead of me. This relationship has changed but it has not ended.

One of the pleasures and joys I have is watching my friends with their mothers and their daughters - I love it when Betty, Julie, Hannah and Maddie are in the same place at the same time. And when Gayle, Cindy and Rachel are sitting at the same table (Rachel doesn't sit very long) it's a thrill for me. MY sister-in-law still has her mother so when she's up here it's her mother, MaryKay, Katie, Erin, Abby, Ella and Grace. In my own family: Carole, Kate, Kayla, Jasmine; Vel and Nic.

I am not envious at all of those relationships. The one I have with my mother is full and complete and my prayer is that they are all like that or become that. It's not until you have no choice about how the mother/daughter relationship works that you understand what you held or what you let go.

I miss my mother everyday but especially today because I haven't quite navigated this new phase of not having her dimensionally here but I am working on it because there are really no good alternatives to getting on with it and because there is so much she would have me do. She was really a woman of powerful faith. And I am her daughter.

Top of the morning!