Today is the day after Easter. I won’t be posting any cute photos of the kids, wearing pretty Easter clothes and chasing down colorful eggs. As a matter of fact, I may not post anything Easter related again. I won’t ever look forward to Easter the way I did every year before this one.
My mom died last week. Out of the blue. Just didn’t wake up on Tues. Her funeral was Sat. It just doesn’t seem real and I pray daily that it’s not – let this be a terrible dream. She was the one person in the entire wide world that I knew would always be there for me. She never got to see Dasha’s hair cut. She didn’t get to hear about our trip to the zoo week before last. She won’t get to see any of the kids (except for Andrew) graduate high school, or get married. She won’t ever come visit and live on the couch for a week again. I have to live the rest of my life without her. How the hell am I gonna do that.
My mom didn’t quite understand why we needed to adopt a little girl from halfway around the world who has Down syndrome. But she wished us luck and asked what she could do anyway. She could not have been more proud of her newest granddaughter. She was sad when we found out Jack would be born with Ds. But she wanted to be at his birth and stayed to get help me and get to know him anyway (and fell in love with him just like the rest of us). She was thrilled when the other kids were born and so happy when we were all together. She loved us all more than we’ll ever know.
I already miss her sitting in her chair, her little pile of kleenexes and lifesaver wrappers, her reading glasses and crossword puzzles. No more cherry Cokes from Steak ‘N Shake, no more pj’s for Christmas, no more 60 degree rooms in July, no more envelopes full of newspaper clippings in my mailbox. There’s something from my mom in every room in my house. Neither of us liked having our picture taken so I don’t even have any of the 2 or us together in the last few years. That was really, really dumb.
So here I am, in the “I don’t have a mom” club. I hate it here.
