I remember so many of the sensations of those months: The sticky summer evenings. The dry, browning grass. I remember the loneliness of it all–Husband was gone on the boat, and I was tackling the most difficult thing in my life.
I remember evenings spent sitting with Mom in the living room–Me rocking my baby girl in the glider, and Mom sitting in her chair. She began to speak more and more of her memories of growing up: Taking her younger brother and sister to see Mary Poppins in the theater, the way she loved the smell of cooking popcorn at baseball games growing up. Sometimes we would just sit quietly and she would gaze at Carolyn, soaking in the newness of her life.
I wish there were more moments to remember. I think I will always feel that I was foolish with my time. I made the move to back to Illinois when Carolyn was 8 weeks old. In the time I was back before Mom’s death, I took one trip to Washington to spend some time with my husband, and one trip to Kansas to celebrate my husband’s grandfather’s birthday. I kick myself for those times away. They were precious times, that I believed that we needed, but if I’d known our time was going to be so short I would never have gone.
I wince at the time I spent wasting time on the internet, or shopping, or just spacing out. Why wasn’t I sitting with Mom? Why wasn’t I just being with her? Why wasn’t I asking her the myriad of questions that I long to know the answers to now? I wasted time. And I hate that.
When I think of time lost, I get angry at myself, but I also get angry at the situation. I was blindsided by my Mom’s decline. I believed we’d have so much more time to get used to losing her. I believed that we’d have a more victorious battle. I believed Mom would find a stretch of good days and we’d live it up again. She’d go to the riverboat, and we’d go to things as Mother and Daughter and Granddaughter. There would be time to talk over the ‘big things.’ I mistakenly thought there would be so many more normal moments, before we came to the slipping away moments. And even those last few precious days looked nothing like I expected.
