One Year

My mother died a year ago today. It is still a bit surreal.





The nuns at PMA where my mother was the librarian and I went to school for 9 years had a mass in remembrance of her today at 6:30 am and I felt my life flash by me through my eyes there. I don't consider myself religious but 13 years of catholic school leaves a lasting impression on you. I thought of myself when I was 5 sitting restlessly at mass staring at the ornate alter especially the angel paintings and wondering why there are stars on one side of the alter and flowers on the other side, my mom sitting in the pews watching me read the first reading (something from ephesians I remember, this is a big deal getting chosen for 1st reading when you are 7) at mass when I was in second grade, my mom watching me receive my first communion in my white dress with the champagne colored flowers that I picked out in my hair, my mom attending mass as a teacher when she taught there, my mom watching me receive my diploma when I was in 8th grade in the shrug that she made, my moms funeral last December 27th with her casket in the middle of the aisle and me bawling my eyes out in the front pew that I cleaned every friday afternoon with sister lucy when I was 10, me sitting at the one year mass admiring the angels on the altar feeling like I am 5 and still wondering what that that phrase in latin painted around the chapel really means when I should be listening to the homily but I have no recollection of it at all. It made me laugh, my mom would have laughed too.



Rest in peace mom, I love you.