May 11..............
I am 53 today. And yet, somewhere, in my psyche I am 7, ...15,..............26,...........................40...I am no longer a young woman. I often think about my mother at this age. Was she feeling old? Tired? Spent? Wasted? I think about her life at 53.
At 53, my mom had a 15 year old daughter, (like me),.....two 25 year old daughters, a 31 year old daughter and a 34 year old daughter. She had 8 grandchildren....She worked full-time, ran a home, and had her own social life.
How did she do it? Did she feel like she was 30 some days and like she was 80 on others? Did she feel like she had years left to do the things that SHE wanted to do and see the things that SHE wanted to see?
Did she spent hours, days and weeks hurrying toward some day in the future that she could call her own, while pedaling so furiously fast she was missing the landscape of today? Did she see beauty in every day?
I think about my mother and I pray that she took the time and the care to live every moment, in the moment, savoring every taste and smell for what it was.
This is my challenge. and sometimes I say, "Mama, mama........................where are you?" I need to ask you these questions. I need to know how much of me is me, and how much of me is her? Sometimes in my head, I *become* her mother. I feel so much older now......................and the wise me longs to take the young mom in my arms and tell her to live life slowly, and to savor every moment,...to live for herself, and that by doing so, she will be living an example for her children.
Maybe she did.....maybe she is somewhere, looking down on me and pondering what a child I am, will always be. Maybe her message to me is the same as my message to her.
Happy Mother's Day, Mom! Ultimately, there is only love, and while we grow, we need to think of our mothers as the bastions of strength and love,.....We ARE our mothers......and all that they learn and share, we also learn and share. I am my mother, as she was her mother,.....I am neither older nor younger than my mom. We just *are*
