A Month Flew By

 

Time flies whether you are having fun or not.   Some say that happens when you reach a certain age.  God knows I am that age.   

I find the fact that mom has been passed over a month hard to fathom.  My life is way different.  Yet I seem to be constantly busy.  My mind is never quiet.   Not a day or should I say an hour goes by without a reminder of my time with mom.  What I would call our ‘precious time’.

I started trying to write the last two days of mom’s life.  Let me rephrase that ‘I started to write about the moment I received the first distressed call about mom’s impending death.’  I somehow started writing several times and never finished not because I did not remember, but because my tears and the ache in my heart kept me from writing about them.

Do not misunderstand:  Those days were beautiful. Those days were special.  Those days were just our last days together.

I have no regrets.  I would not do anything different.  I just point blank  .  .  .  miss her.  In the last 16 months, if I was not with mom, I was educating myself about her illnesses; talking with her medical team and hospice; writing about her or editing her photos or finding something to bring to her that she needed or would make her life better.   There were days I was even preparing for the inevitable by making photo books, poster boards of good times at both her supportive living facility and the rehab facility she has been living at for the past 16 months and working on a special video for mom.

 

This past month I have been going through many phases.  The two most noticeable to me and some of my friends and family have to do with cleanliness and the color purple.

Cleanliness as I have mentioned in the past was so important to mom.  She was a perfectionist.  Ever since I can remember when I feel anxious, I clean too.  My favorite things to clean our closets and drawers: mine, Ron’s, the pantry, the linen closet, our office closets. .  .  Closets!!!  Well I can attest that my closets are the cleanest they have been in ages.  Even my drawers are immaculate.  I feel when I am cleaning that I am making mom proud because she enjoyed cleaning so much.

Mom’s favorite color was purple. She loved all shades from lilac to deep dark purple.  Since she is gone I have been surprised at how magnetized I am to this color.  I am seeing a shade of purple almost everywhere I go. I have been drawn to buy items of this color because purple reminds me that mom is still with me.  The more I surround myself the more I feel mom’s presence.  I know mom is still with me with or without the purple and yet the color is of great comfort.

  A week before mom died, I needed to replace my cell phone cover, I was looking for the exact same cover I had in aqua which is one of my favorite colors.  I was so disappointed that the only color they still had was purple.  I purchased that phone cover and now know that I was supposed to have a purple one.  The phone was an important part of mom and my relationship.  Each and every time I was with her I took photos of mom and everything and everybody that surrounded her.  She did not know how to use my phone but she loved when I would take the photos and show them to her.  How appropriate that my phone will always remind me of her and our special time together.

During the first few weeks, when I passed by stores I felt the need to see to go in and check out their purple clothing. Then I noticed that I seemed to notice the purple flowers more than any other color flowers.  I know what I am doing I am searching for anything that reminds me of mom.  Sometimes just seeing the color makes me think mom had something to do with putting the color there.  To me I feel as though she is saying   “Julienne, I am OK.  I am Happy.  Thank you for letting me go.”

I know she is in a better place.  I know she is in heaven with Our Lord.  I know time with our loved ones is too be cherished every day because there are no guarantees in life.

I just miss her.