DogWoman's Open Salon Blog

Missing Mom on My First Mother’s Day Without Her

Mon, 11 May 2009 02:05:29 -0400

Dismissed by Mom during my Tender Deathbed Scene

Inspired by Steve Blevins’ delicious concoction of humor and poignancy titled “Mom Feels Great, but I’m Planning Her Funeral Anyway,” I’ve decided it’s time to tell a few stories about the last week I spent with my mom. Regarding other OS Mother’s Day posts (with abject apologies to friends whose posts I haven’t yet read ~ please send me a link to yours), I’d like to recommend hatchetface’s moving post “Two Poems for My Mother,” containing perhaps the most concise description I've ever read of what a great mother should be. Also bbd’s “thank you mom,” featuring a 40’s starlet-esque photo of his gutsy mom who modeled the kindness this world needs. Finally, “Woman of All Roses” by Gary Justis with luminous photos and a picture of his mom holding grandson Gregory, a transcendent gift that validates photography.

A year ago, in the spring of 2008, Mom had open-heart surgery. She spent the month of April in the hospital—arriving with the Magnolias; staying through the Crocus, Daffodils, Tulips, Flowering Crabapples, and Violets; and coming home with the Redbuds. Living almost an entire year after this surgery, Mom celebrated with Dad their 60th Wedding Anniversary on June 14th. She continued to have trouble with fluid, though, and congestive heart failure finally claimed her on March 14, 2009.

(photo by Samantha & Charlie)

In order to give Dad and my sister Sylvia a break, I spent five days taking care of Mom, coming back to my own home exactly a week before she died. I’ve written previously about things Mom was having trouble doing that we take for granted, as well as ways in which she was lucky. It was a difficult week. Like Dad the last year of Mom’s life, I was on call all day. I helped Mom with intensely personal tasks she found embarrassing. I was sore from unaccustomed physical motions including bending and kneeling. Occasionally, confused about how many of the day’s 23 tablets she’d taken, Mom would argue with us and try to avoid taking them.

I tried to tempt Mom’s diminishing appetite with my newly perfected cream of potato soup, her knockout pumpkin pie (which I baked in Ohio and transported to Indiana), Irish Breakfast tea and the Scottish shortbread she relished a year ago. She sampled everything but eating was now a Sisyphean task instead of the joy it had always been during her lifetime. It was heartbreaking to watch Mom peck at her food and just as I was beginning to feel restless, hear her sweetly apologize for eating so slowly.

A woman of action, I was a whirling dervish that week ~ cleaning the bathrooms, recycling old magazines and newspapers, throwing out loosely wrapped food from the full-size freezer, separating plastic lids that belonged in the trash from Dad’s recycling, running laundry, cleaning out the fridge (including a mayonnaise jar from 2006), watering Mom’s African violets, changing the tablecloth, finagling an appointment with the podiatrist to cut Mom’s claws while I was there, setting my husband Steve the task of researching adjustable beds, giving Mom a shower and setting her hair, clipping her fingernails, and playing Scrabble (which I actively dislike) every evening. I recount this not to persuade you that I am a good daughter or to remind God to add these tasks to the plus side of my tally column, but to give you an idea of my mindset. I was tired, stressed, and getting grouchy. I was fantasizing about going home.

At the end of the fourth day, I left Mom sitting on her walker by the sink in the back bathroom brushing her teeth. I needed something from the front of the house. Because she was retaining fluid from congestive heart failure, Mom was under strict orders not to drink any water; she could only drink Boost Plus, one cup of French Press Kenya coffee Dad made her every morning, and one other hot drink with her Scrabble game in the evening. Sylvia and Dad had even somehow managed to get hell to freeze over—Mom was now swallowing her 23 tablets a day with either Boost or yogurt. When I came back to the bathroom, frazzled and exhausted, Mom had finished cleaning her teeth and flashed me a sneaky grin. With a defiant twinkle in her eye, my 85-year-old mother confessed, “I didn’t even snitch any water while you were gone.” But I could have, she left unspoken. It was the first time during the week that I saw a flash of humor from her.

I felt something click inside of me. I felt an upwelling of admiration for this little woman battling an insidious disease quietly and cheerfully with courage and toughness. I felt ashamed of feeling put upon, impatient, squeamish, and anxious to flee to the comforts of my own home & family. I remembered why I’d asked to be allowed to come visit Mom (If I’d said I was coming to help take care of Mom, Dad would have barked, “I don’t need any help! I can take care of her myself. I have been for the past year. She’s my wife.”)

(Mary with Mom and our first dog Patsy)

As I tucked Mom in bed, I kissed her eyes repeatedly. I’m the baby and the most hands-on of the three children. Like Mom in the past (and both of my sibs), I get bad headaches and have discovered how good it feels to receive firm kisses on my eyes when I’m hurting. Mom crooned, “I love you. Thank you for everything you do.”

On Friday, my last day, I got up at 7 a.m. and had to rush to get Mom ready to leave for the pulmonologist’s by 9 a.m. It literally took Mom an hour and a half to eat 12 bites of Honey Nut Cheerios with one raisin per bite, drink one Boost, and take a dish full of medications. While she was eating, I raced to my sister’s house, cater-corner to the southwest, to take a shower. Dad has well water and the iron content makes my hair stand on end. Sylvia’s city water makes a hot shower a guilty pleasure. Soaking in the elegance of her neat, clean, and beautifully furnished home on the way in and out was an added bonus.

Returning home warm, squeaky clean, and with my long hair still wet, I was rewarded by Mom’s second burst of merriment. Sitting at his usual place at the end of the kitchen table, Dad was reading the morning paper. Suddenly he demanded, “Where’d the front section get to?” Dad is famous for never accepting responsibility for misplacing his own possessions. He often says, “Your mother moved things and I can’t find my --- [fill in name of lost item of the moment].” After Dad had been searching for a few frantic moments, a girlish peal of laughter escaped from Mom’s lips. The front section of the newspaper had been on Dad’s lap, hidden by the tablecloth, the whole time!

9 a.m. was fast approaching and Mom was still using the bathroom. Dad and I decided drastic measures were in order. I changed Mom’s clothes from her pajamas to the outfit she had selected for the doctor visit while she was still sitting in the bathroom. Dad brought in her shoes and a shoehorn and knelt next to her walker once she was washing her hands, brushing her hair, powdering her nose, and painstakingly applying her signature lipstick. I cheekily quipped to Mom: “This may be the first time Dad has ever knelt down in front of you.”

Dad is the quintessential engineer with note cards and a pen in his pocket at all times—a bit dour, pragmatic, and not gifted in the social skills. When I think of men kneeling, I think of dreamy Jane Austen films where the younger sister whispers, “Do you think he’ll kneel? They always kneel, you know.”

“You probably didn’t kneel when you proposed, did you, Dad?” I asked nonchalantly.

“Yes, I did,” Dad answered from the floor as he gently and lovingly slid Mom’s dainty foot into a square-toed blue pump.

I felt the room tilt. Age 50, I had never heard this discussed before.

“Really? In the living room at Grammie and Grandpa’s house?” I guessed [the house where Dad grew up and my cousin now lives, cater-corner to the northeast].

“Yes,” my chivalrous and gallant father responded simply.

(Esther & David's engagement photo next to the glorious phlox in my grandparents' back yard)

We had to wait an hour and a half for Mom’s CT scan, so long that the techs gave us a $5 coupon for free goodies from the hospital coffee shop (there is a God and He understands my need for chocolate). The personable and disarmingly honest pulmonologist confirmed what I’ve been telling Dad for weeks: Mom’s dying and there’s almost nothing we can do about it. He used about five medical terms I’d never heard that I wish I’d written down for my brother, all of which meant that she was losing weight, failing to thrive, and starving to death. He took Dad and I out in the hall to look at the scans and told us that Mom only had “weeks up to maybe a year” left to live. He was wrong. Mom died exactly one week later.

That evening I laid a fire with walnut and cherry I’d brought from home and we sat at the card table in front of its warmth. I fixed Mom hot tea to drink with her coffee shop cookie. Mom and I finished our epic five-night Scrabble game. She trounced me.

I suspected that I would never see Mom again. This time, after I tucked her in, I walked around to Dad’s side of the bed and climbed in under the covers with her. Dad and Sylvia were at the symphony. Mom lay on her right side facing the closets so I curled up on my right side with my knees folded inside her knees, draped my left arm around her waist, and held her hand. I lay still until her breathing stabilized and I knew she slept. Only then, confident I wouldn’t wake her, I allowed myself the luxury of quiet tears and barely perceptible shuddering as I snuggled my mommy one last time.

Before long, Mom woke up and told me in that unmistakable Mom tone that it was late and I’d better get to bed. Since she was awake anyway, I came back around to her side of the bed and knelt down next to her. I told her everything I thought I’d better say before she died. “You’ve been a great mom—loving and supportive and wonderful. I think I was probably pretty spoiled and useless and unappreciative when I lived at home. I never really understood what you did for us until I had my own children.”

I heard a faint giggle in the semi-darkness. “Your sister said she didn’t get it until the first time she took her children camping. Living in a tent, everything full of sand, cooking on a Coleman stove, doing everything for everyone else—she finally realized how easy you had it growing up.”

(My sister Sylvia, Mom, Dad, and my brother Alan camping with our dog Patsy before I was born)

“I wish I could stay longer,” I said honestly, despite the week’s frustrations and fears and the toll it was taking on my body. “It’s so unfair that I’m the only one who doesn’t work outside the home and has time to spend with you but I’m the only one who lives out of state. I want to be here with you, but [my disabled husband] Steve needs me to help him and Andrew really misses me—you know, he’s only 15.”

“You’ve been a big help, but you need to go home to your own family now,” Mom proclaimed with authority. “Andrew and Steve need you.”

My tender deathbed scene didn’t end quite the way I expected. I was still on my knees, holding Mom’s hand, weeping freely now with my voice breaking. Suddenly, Mom said dismissively, “OK, that’s enough. We both need to get some sleep now.”

She was pleasant but firm and I easily made the translation. “We both know I’m dying and you’ll never see me again. You’ve said everything that needs to be said. I appreciate everything you’ve done for me—last spring during my surgeries and in the year since then. You’ve kissed me and held me and cried over me. Now I’m tired and I just want to sleep. Go home to your own family and let me go.”

My brother has been trying to tell me for years how steely our mother is, how pragmatic, stubborn, and strong she is. I’ve only been able to see it the past few years. This isn’t how deathbed scenes transpire in Jane Austen. I had to smile despite myself. I’d just been dismissed.

In the intervening week I spoke to Mom on the phone several times. She was coherent and loving. The next time I saw her, she was lying on her right side facing the closets, her mouth slightly ajar, sleeping the long and peaceful sleep of death. I washed her and dressed her with Dad’s assistance and a few days later we laid her to rest under a magnificent oak tree.

On this first Mother’s Day without you, I miss you, Mom.

I’ll carry you with me always, striving to honor you by evincing your kindness, thoughtfulness, mischief and merriment, pragmatism, courage, and gratitude for all the blessings in my life.

I love you, Mom.

Slimedog Millionhair ~ The Weasel's Oscar Performance

Sat, 25 Apr 2009 10:04:21 -0400

Last night Sasha brought me a favorite ball to throw over the family room couch. Andrew was sitting on the couch doing his homework and tried to block my throw with one of his school binders. Thus developed a new game. I got a point for every throw Sasha caught and he got a point for every shot he deflected. Soon the ball was slimed. I moaned about the "slime dog," and then in a rare moment of inspiration quipped, "Slimedog millionhair!" Steve about lost it and almost immediately came back to his lair to photoshop this. You know what they say about small minds being easily amused. What can I say? He's a genius. Hope this brightens your weekend! No weasels were harmed during the filming of this Oscar-winning performance (but lots of hairballs were created).

White shores are calling ~ You and I will meet again . . .

Mon, 20 Apr 2009 17:04:07 -0400

Many of you know that my mom died 5 weeks ago, on March 14th. I spent 18 days in Indianapolis with Dad, being there for support and transacting boatloads of burial, memorial, and financial business. About 24 hours after I came home to Ohio, my younger son Andrew came down with the worst looking throat our doctor has seen all year--he had to have an immediate shot of cortisone and one of penicillin to keep his airway open. It turned out to be strep. The Thursday before Easter I went back to Dad's and ending up staying another 9 days. The day I came home from the second trip (Friday, April 17th), my wonderful hubby Steve took Andrew back to the doctor because he was so tired and run down. The doctor said he has mono, his spleen is enlarged, and no more volleyball for a while (including a huge weekend tournament this Friday & Saturday). I'm still hoping that life will return to a calmer pace and that I'll be able to catch up on my e-mail and once again read your posts on OS (after I get groceries, make phone calls, and clean the house). Writing and photography are ways I make sense of events in my life, so please bear with me as various aspects of my mother's death are my subject matter for the next few posts. I'll eventually put up more photos of the amazing Weasel, and I'm keen to write about the phenomenal new Decemberists CD The Hazards of Love, a birthday gift from my older son (the guitarist) James.

My thoughts and prayers are with you as you ford the rough waters of your own life, and I hope you'll find a peaceful green shore where you can rest and enjoy the beauty and wonder of Spring.

Before Mom's graveside service, I asked Dad if he would think it odd if I took my camera. "I'm taking mine," he replied. As friends have observed, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree.

My 86-year-old Dad and our 15-year-old son Andrew carry Mom's casket to the lovely spot she selected at Indianapolis' Crown Hill cemetery.

Behind Dad on the far side are Jim (the son of my sister Sylvia, The Wood Elf here on OS), and Charlie (son of my brother Alan). Behind Andrew on the near side are Keith (husband of my brother's daughter Esther) and my brother Alan.

Our older son James was in New York City for the first time ever during his Spring Break from college with his girlfriend, whose cousin lives in NYC. I told James that Grammie would have wanted him to enjoy this once-in-a-lifetime trip and that he shouldn't cut his trip short to come home for the mid-week graveside service. James was able to attend the Memorial Service and spend the weekend with my family.

Dr. Richard Hamilton, retired senior minister at North United Methodist Church and our family's pastor for 23 years, presided at the graveside service. Dick Hamilton is the brother of retired Indiana Congressman Lee Hamilton; both are renowned for their intelligence, compassion, integrity, work ethic, and tireless efforts to make the world a better place. Dick spoke to us quietly and casually, as though we were a group of friends gathering for conversation and fellowship. He spoke of the places Mom had lived and traveled, and wondered, for the first time he said, whether after death we will be able to revisit places dear to us during life. Dick lost his lifetime companion, Anna Lee, four years ago, and must have been thinking of her too.

My brother suggested that we purchase a casket made by the Monks of St. Meinrad's in southern Indiana. Dad & I selected a simple poplar casket, stained an attractive cherry color. The funeral home that Dad chose to work with, Flanner & Buchanan, carried it.

Dad has grown roses for 50 years and brought a single pink rose (store bought as too early for his) to the service. My sister Sylvia is behind Dad on the right and her youngest daughter Emily is behind him on the left.

My brother Alan's youngest girl, Elizabeth, sang Grammie to sleep with the haunting and comforting song "Into the West" from The Lord of the Rings, The Return of the King. Elizabeth is studying history at Hanover College, where she receives a scholarship for her vocal talent. She is wearing a necklace that belonged to her grandmother.

Here are the lyrics:

Lay down
Your sweet and weary head
Night is falling
You have come to journey’s end

Sleep now

Dream--of the ones who came before
They are calling
From across a distant shore

Why do you weep?
What are these tears upon your face?
Soon you will see
All of your fears will pass away

Safe in my arms
You’re only sleeping

What can you see
On the horizon?
Why do the white gulls call?

Across the sea
A pale moon rises
The ships have come
To carry you home

And all will turn to silver glass
A light on the water
All souls pass

Hope fades
Into the world of night
Through shadows falling
Out of memory and time

Don’t say
We have come now to the end
White shores are calling
You and I will meet again

And you’ll be here in my arms
Just sleeping

What can you see
On the horizon?
Why do the white gulls call?

Across the sea
A pale moon rises
The ships have come
To carry you home

And all will turn to silver glass
A light on the water
Grey ships pass
Into the West

My brother's son Charlie hands his son Benjamin crocus, scilla, and snowdrops from my dad's yard to place on the casket. While the family scattered flowers, I played Irish Tenor John McDermott's unbearably tender "Danny Boy," a love song sung by a mother to her son, on Andrew's CD player.

Here are the lyrics:

Oh, Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling
From glen to glen and down the mountainside
The summer's gone and all the roses falling,
'Tis you, 'tis you must go and I must bide.
But come ye back when summer's in the meadow,
Or when the valley's hushed and white with snow,
'Tis I'll be here in sunshine or in shadow,
Oh, Danny boy, oh Danny boy, I love you so.

And if you come and all the flowers are dying,
And I am dead - as dead I well may be -
You'll come and find the place where I am lying
And kneel and say an Ave there for me;
And I shall hear, though soft your tread above me,
And on my grave will warmer, sweeter be,
And ye shall bend and tell me that you love me,
And I shall sleep in peace until you come to me.

Charlie gives Ben a handful of earth to scatter on the casket also. My sister Sylvia is Catholic and I asked her at the end of the service if she said an Ave for Mom. "Yes, in three languages," she replied. She teaches French, so I knew two were English & French, but I had to ask whether the third language was Spanish or German, which she can speak passably, or Latin, from ancient masses. It was Latin. Near the end of this heartbreaking yet comforting tune, I bent and said, "I love you, Mom."

My brother Alan asked if we could end the service by singing the hymn "Blest Be the Ties that Bind," a traditional closing for United Methodist Women's Circle Meetings. Benjamin holds hands with his Grandpa (out of frame), as Charlie and his wife Samantha join hands with Dr. Hamilton.

My brother's wife Joy and her older daughter Esther, named after my mother and my father's mother.

My sister Sylvia's oldest daughter Katie, who flew out from Oregon, and her youngest daughter Emily with husband Michael (far right).

Sylvia (in brocade) is flanked by all her living children--Jim, Katie, and Emily with Michael. Emily is expecting their first baby at the end of May and looked absolutely radiant. "There'll be one child born in this world to carry on, to carry on . . . " Dad took this photo.

My cousin Paula (daughter of Dad's brother Jerry) and her husband Ed.

Dad taking photos with his impressive Nikon D-300 (we only have a Nikon D-200; as usual the ol' man is ahead of us in the photographic latest-and-greatest department). Dad loves blue and bright colors and was glad that spring flowers were coming up when Mom died.

Another one of Dad's photos. Dad's rose and crocus, scilla & snowdrops from his and his neighbors' yards.

The day before Mom died, she slept almost all day. Sylvia sat near her, held her hand, and sang to her. One of the songs she sang is "Too-ra Loo-ra Loo-ra, an Irish Lullaby." Sylvia requested that the family sing it at the end of the service. Here's a version sung by John McDermott, Anthony Kearns, and Ronan Tynan, The Irish Tenors.

Here are the lyrics:

Over in Killarney, many years ago
My mother sang a song to me in tones so sweet and low
Just a simple little ditty in her good old Irish way
And I'd give the world if she would sing that song to me this day

Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ra
Too-ra-loo-ra-li
Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ra
Hush now, don't you cry

Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ra
Too-ra-loo-ra-li
Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ra
It's an Irish lullaby

Oft in dreams I've wandered to that cot again
I feel her arms a-huggin' me as when she held me then
And I hear her voice a-hummin' to me as in days of yore
When she used to rock me fast asleep outside the cabin door.

Chorus

Sylvia hugs Emily as she weeps during the lullaby that she had sung to our mother only five days earlier. Katie completes this family trio. Sylvia said Mom smiled a crooked smile and squeezed her hand when she sang to her on the last day of her life. Thanks for all your caregiving, sis.

Dad took this photo of my Steve, Andrew, me, Keith & Esther, and Joy.

Here I add the last bouquets of the flowers Andrew, Dad, and I picked. This photo was also taken by Dad.

Charlie & Samantha brought the beautiful lilies.

Here we all are next to Mom's huge oak tree. Left to right, front row: Samantha, Steve & Mary (me), Dad, Sylvia, Katie, Emily & Michael, Jim. Back row, left to right: Benjamin, Charlie, Joy, Elizabeth, Alan, Esther & Keith, Andrew, Dick Hamilton, Paula & Ed. Thanks to the Flanner & Buchanan representative for taking the photo of all of us.

Esther Margaret knew that Grandpa would approve of her blue and brightly colored dress.

Benjamin with his Grandpa, my brother Alan.

My sweet, fun, and wonderful sister-in-law Joy (aptly named) with my beautiful sister Sylvia. Dad asked the women to go through Mom's jewelry, so many of us were wearing sentimental pieces which we had just been given.

My lovely cousin Paula, representing our beloved Uncle Jerry's family.

This magnificent oak tree is the reason Mom selected her gravesite. When Sylvia's middle daughter Sarah died in a car accident in 1997, Sylvia selected a plot on a grassy knoll with large trees. Mom decided that she wanted to be buried near a large tree also and traded in the mausoleum space Dad had purchased for this location. Charlie and Benjamin admire Mom's tree.

Three generations: my brother Alan on the right, his son Charlie on the left, and grandson Benjamin between them.

Benjamin loves heavy equipment and his grandfather's truck.

Sleep in peace, Mom, beneath your regal oak. I'm confident that in time you and I will meet again.

I love you.

The Things We Buried

Sun, 5 Apr 2009 11:04:11 -0400

Three weeks ago, when I woke up Saturday, I put together a piece about Mom for Steve to post. I’d spent a week taking care of Mom and listed things I took for granted that my time with her enabled me to appreciate and ways Mom was lucky despite many trials of illness and age. On my way to a morning appointment, before the post went up, I learned Mom had died overnight. It was time. She’d stopped eating and had slept the previous day. She wasn’t in pain, but the end came sooner than we expected and caught us by surprise.

I canceled my appointment, turned around and came home, finished packing, and made the three-hour drive to Indianapolis. Mom died in her sleep at home in her own bed. My family knew I wanted to wash and dress Mom for burial, so they had a neighborhood doctor come to the house to certify the death and delayed calling the funeral home until after I arrived. With Dad’s assistance, I gently washed and dressed Mom in her underwear, slip, hose, and the outfit she had requested, a beautiful burgundy dress complete with a necklace given her by dear friend Millicent, her favorite pearl clip-on earrings, powder on her cheeks and nose, and one of her signature Revlon lipsticks, Baby Berry.

Remembering how we tucked special stuffed animals under Mom’s elbows in the hospital a year ago, my sister-in-law Joy tucked Larry Bear under one arm and John Koala under the other. I couldn’t stand to let the bear I gave Mom go, so I moved Larry Bear to my room and left John Koala with her. Dad and I had to leave immediately for the local branch of the funeral home to make arrangements, so my sister and sister-in-law stayed until the downtown branch of Flanner & Buchanan came and took Mom’s body away with them.

For various reasons, Dad, Steve, and I wish to be cremated, but Mom was traditional and wished to be buried. It seemed to me that as long as she was going to be buried, she might as well have some comfort items tucked in with her, in case they might comfort her in whatever place she now watched over us, might be a testament to our love for her if anyone ever unearthed her remains thousands of years from now, or might make laying her earthly shell in the cold, dark ground easier for us.

Here’s a photo of Mom taken in February 2008 after she had surgery to remove what was thought to be a huge cancerous tumor. It turned out to be a cantaloupe-sized benign cyst so Mom named the bear I gave her in the hospital after Dr. Larry Stevens, the personable and gifted surgeon who announced the miraculous outcome to us. Larry Bear now sits on the heirloom walnut rocking chair in my parents’ home, as I couldn’t let him go just yet. Isn’t Mom lovely?

Here’s a pictorial essay of the things we buried with Mom.

Here’s the stuffed koala that was tucked under Mom’s arm when the funeral home employees came and took her body away. My brother’s son Charlie gave this koala to Mom in April of 2008 after her heart surgery. Mom named him John Koala after her phenomenal heart surgeon Dr. John Fehrenbacher. John Koala kept Mom’s body company from Saturday afternoon until Wednesday morning. I took the remainder of the items below to the Broadripple Flanner & Buchanan on Wednesday morning to be placed in the casket prior to the burial service that afternoon.

That’s me in the photo when I was only a few months old. Mom bought me Teddy Bear, whom I called TB. I stuck by the name even though I was teased about why I’d named an animal after a disease. I slept and played with stuffed animals growing up, took a few to college, carried on the tradition with my sons who both had lovey things (G-Man the alligator and Iggy the iguana), and found TB lovingly stored in a box in my closet.

Mom was a devout Red Sox fan for more than 85 years. Here she is celebrating the 2007 World Series victory with my family. Left to right behind Mom is Andrew, Steve, James, Sasha (The Weasel), and me.

I sealed both photos and the letter & cards below in a plastic bag. I figured if anyone unearthed my mother’s casket thousands of years hence, the unenvironmental plastic would still be inviolate and people could see who Mom was and read how we loved her.

My brother’s daughter Esther Margaret suggested that we bury Mom’s Red Sox cap with her. Dad saw it in my hands and said, “What are you doing with that?” When I explained, Dad objected. Although never a fan himself, Dad claimed to need a baseball cap for the church Mardi Gras parade or other occasions when he’s supposed to wear something unusual. We think he just couldn’t say that he wanted Mom’s signature BoSox hat to stay in the coat closet where he can see it. We settled on her favorite Red Sox t-shirt, purchased by Steve decades ago during a business trip to Boston. When Dad asked us to divide Mom’s clothes, I brought home an identical shirt recently purchased by Steve on ebay to replace this well loved original.

Esther’s husband Keith suggested that we include Scrabble tiles that spelled out “I love you.” When my sister-in-law Joy, my sister Sylvia, and I were going through Mom’s jewelry, we found her initials on these Scrabble tile pins that were given to her by Sylvia’s daughter Katie. As noted in my earlier post, only a week before her death, Mom thumped me in an epic five-day Scrabble game.

My brother’s youngest daughter Elizabeth asked that we include this cross-stitch of a pink Iris she had given Grammie. Pink was one of Mom’s favorite colors and Elizabeth liked the symbolism of Iris, the Greek goddess who acts as messenger of the gods, can travel to and from the underworld with impunity, and is represented by a rainbow.

When we called Mom’s PEO service group to tell them of Mom’s passing, one of the ladies asked if we intended to bury Mom with her PEO star. At that point, we hadn’t gone through her jewelry yet and it hadn’t occurred to us. As soon as we found it, we decided that it should be pinned on Mom’s dress. Mom was a member of Indianapolis Chapter AJ.

Mom was also an enthusiastic and loyal DePauw University graduate.

When I got home from taking care of Mom for a week, I asked our older son to send Grammie a card. Luckily, James sent something immediately. Here’s the front of the envelope he sent her. Note the butterfly stamp.

Dad went nuts about this note James wrote about the butterfly stamp. Dad loves commemorative stamps, is an ardent environmentalist, and is an inveterate note writer on the back of envelopes.

James didn’t just send a card, he wrote an enthusiastic, newsy letter. My sister Sylvia reported that Mom made a big fuss about James’ letter, which she received the Thursday before she died. The last day she spoke to any of us, Mom told a number of people about the long, lovely letter she had received from her grandson. Thank you, James, for getting this to her in time. I spoke to Mom briefly that evening, but didn’t mail her anything myself.

Andrew, who may actually be a polar bear in spirit, sent Mom this card. As parents often do, I gave him suggestions about what to say. “Just say, ‘I’m thinking of you’ or ‘I love you and miss you’ but don’t say ‘Get well soon’ or ‘I hope you’re feeling better’ because she’s dying.”

You can see how well my advice worked! Andrew dismissed my objections by reassuring me that he wanted to take the hopeful and optimistic tack. Mom never woke up enough on Friday to read Andrew’s card.

I asked Steve to whip up a quick card for Mom on the computer. He spent half a day creating this, including locating a Boston Red Sox font (he’s obsessive about fonts).

Sadly, I opened this card the evening Mom died. I’m so glad that James covered the family in glory with his effusive letter since Andrew’s polars and Steve’s BoSox arrived too late for Mom to enjoy in this life.

The day we buried Mom, on Wednesday, March 18^th, Dad’s front yard was a riot of Crocus. Andrew and I picked deep purple, purple & white striped, golden yellow, and white Crocus to place on her casket as it was lowered.

Dad’s front yard was also carpeted with these beautiful blue Scilla. Andrew picked these to include in our flower bouquets.

Dad walked across the street to his neighbors of 50 years. The Mitchells were in Florida and Dad wanted to include them by incorporating their Snowdrops into our homegrown offerings.

Here are the 20 bouquets we took to the graveside service with us. Andrew and I assembled them in the kitchen as Steve handed us the wet paper towels.

Here I am holding the flowers on our way to Crown Hill Cemetery. On my right arm, I’m wearing bracelets given to me by my Irish “sister” Ivy in honor of her sister, Patty, our friend who died while serving as a flight attendant on SwissAir Flight 111. Our dear friend Maha from Kuwait made the Swarovski crystal heart necklace for me. The hand-beaded earrings come from Cheyenne friend Floyd Black Bear. I wanted to include these beloved friends in my mother’s passing and service.

These are the things we buried with Mom.

Extreme Sheepherding

Sat, 4 Apr 2009 14:04:00 -0400

Received this in an e-mail from my husband Steve's college volleyball coach, who owned an amazing German Shepherd named Shaker while we were in college at Earlham. David is one of the few people I know who "gets" the way I feel about dogs. He received this from his daughter, so it appears to be a family affair.

I thought this Welsh sheepdog diversion would cheer everyone up on a Saturday afternoon. Amazing stuff -- the Pong and Mona Lisa in particular, though the fireworks at the end are also a personal favorite.

Enjoy!!! :)

Mary and The Weasel

Here's an explanatory video produced by the BBC.