I remember momma

Today is Mother's Day. I awoke with a quiet knowing that today is Mother's Day and I am motherless. My mother left us when I was 35 years old. I had just filed for divorce that same week, and my life felt like a too-big pair of ugly pants that had just fallen to my ankles. How would I make it now, my mother dead, and me alone to mother my three children? It's not as though my mother was involved in my life so much, she wasn't. For many years she was ill with things I will not speak of, and we were not close until the year before her death. Her illness, which eventually separated her from friends and many of her family, brought us closer. She was grounded by the oxygen tank, and it's umbilical cord. She was on house arrest with the crime of being ill. But it gave us the opportunity to be still with her, to help her, to talk to her and listen. It was so hard to see her suffer that when she died, I felt relief for her. Laying next to her in the hospital on a little cot the night before she died, I listened to her labored breathing full of bubbling, congested agony. If I slipped off to sleep I would awake with a start and listen to see if she was still there. Just after I went home that next morning she passed away. Her suffering ended, ours began.
Life without your mother is a wrenching blow that guts you, leaving a path of your bloody entrails for the world to see. And what's more, you don't care. Let the blood thirsty wolves of life come and rip me to shreds while I sleep, what does it matter any more?
But then, life goes on. You learn to grow up, learn to stop waiting for her to call, she won't. You learn that what ever gifts she gave you are all you have to last you for the rest of your life, so guard them well.
After I dressed this morning I left the house early, went to the store and bought a bouquet of flowers. I drove to the cemetery and placed them at my mother's grave. That, and a Bud Lite I brought from home. I stood in the rain and thanked her for the gifts she gave me. She was resourceful during the poorest of times. She was industrious and never gave up. She worked at her faith, praying, seeking, beseeching God for everyone's needs. She had a marvelous sense of humor, and a hearty laugh. She hugged everyone that came into our home and made everyone feel welcome. She had a fierce protective mother shield that no one could penetrate, and I knew that anyone who would ever wish us harm would recieve a serious Marg Vogel ass whooping. I felt loved. She was not a perfect mother, and now that I am 53 I see that none of us are, but she was my mother. And today, this Mothers' Day, I dearly miss her.