Heart Full—Thinking About Mom

I got a call from my sister about an hour ago and we believe my Mom got up out of bed for the last time today. I will probably be driving down to the Cape tomorrow because I don't want my last conversation with her to be on the phone. I just can't do that.

This is a picture of her taken in 1946 when she was 19 years old. She was beautiful, wasn't she? I remember watching her dress up in this blue satin dress to go to parties with my Dad when I was a little girl. She was beautiful then, too.

She's still beautiful now though in a deeper way. Since my Dad died in 2002, I've had the chance to forge a different relationship with Mom. She told me about a month ago that she felt she could talk to me about anything, that she could call me to talk any time. After so many years of difficulties between us—this fiercely independent daughter and this fiercely protective wife and mother—I finally felt that I could talk to her about anything.

I'm so grateful we got here. While I weep, I try to remind myself that at least we had this time.

Mom became the still center of our lives in her later years, the one place where all "News Hakala" could be discovered and discussed. Since the beginning of the year, she's given us time to come to terms with the idea that she's leaving us. This time is her last gift to her children.

I have no more words so I've turned to the poet Mary Oliver to help me finish this blog. This is an excerpt from "A Poem for the Blue Heron" from her book American Primitive.

Now the woods are empty,

the ponds shine like blind eyes,

the wind is shouldering against

the black, wet

bones of the trees.

In a house down the road,

as though I had never seen these things—

leaves, the loose tons of water,

a bird with an eye like a full moon

deciding not to die after all—

I sit out the long afternoons

drinking and talking;

I gather wood, kindling, paper; I make fire

after fire after fire.