Tag: memories

Mother’s Day Memories – Gift of Touch

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Reconnecting with an old family friend, Mary Bo, after 30 years, my first memory of her mom,  Issie, who was like a mother to me, awakens.

I’m sitting on her lap, the calm exquisite feeling of her brushing and brushing my hair envelops me.

I follow the memory of touch to my sister Judi and I, before our teens, sharing a room, bed and back rubs in France.Playing scratchies was one of our few quiet times together.

This comfort resurfaces with my own daughter Nicole and is reciprocated, not only making us feel good, but easing our pain.

And now I’ve transferred this great habit on to my granddaughter Alyssa who asks for massages before bed.

May this gift of touch continue in all of our lifetimes.

Alleluia for the sensitivity of women. Happy Mother’s Day to all my family and friends!

Free To Bloom update and events:

  • Ebook now available on Smashwords.
  • WSLR 96.5 lpfm Tues. May 10 at 9am – interview
  • Circle Books on St Armands Circle Sun. May 15 11 am – 1 pm – Book Signing
  • Selby Library May 25 11:30 am – 12:30 pm Book Signing and discussion

 

Memories – Old Slices

Reading Spartina by John Casey. Not my favorite topic – boat life in New England – but I’ve dog-eared so many pages of good stuff. Like a memory of a father that brought tears to my eyes and looming memories of mine. I fight the slide into my father’s later life.

He sits alone in his recliner in his big empty house waiting for the phone not to ring. Year after year. And it doesn’t. Financial papers are strewn in piles at his feet, waiting for the attention he will never again give them. He hates what’s happening to him;  watching the bedrock of his life – his superior mind – crumble into dust.

“How’re you doing Dad?” I ask.”

“I’m gonna jump off the bridge.” or “I’m gonna shoot myself.” or some other form of suicide.

“We want to take you out for dinner.”

“Got stuff in the fridge I gotta use up.”

Right. Like the moldy bacon?  Or the bottle of orange juice, so sour that Terry spewed it out like a surging fire hydrant after the first swig. He’s stubborn just to be stubborn. So closed up inside he can’t break out of his hard Cancer shell. He’d rather suffer loneliness than crack open and let his guts spill out. 

But time passes. The teeth-gnashing and hair-pulling stage subsides until he forgets how to be stubborn and closed in; forgets how to hate losing his mind.

And at long last. He smiles and hugs and kisses me hello and good-bye. He (the absolute atheist) goes to church because he likes the music and sings along. He says ‘I love you’ for the first time in my life.