Dear Mom - 2 years out.

Dear Mom,

It's been two years since Dad called--his voice nearly unrecognizable--and said, "Honey, she's gone." It wasn't a surprise. You said, often, you wanted to go "fast and first" and you did.  First being that you didn't have to wake a single day in a world where Dad wasn't.  Fast--well that is a relative term. You meant to have a heart attack. But the cancer that was discovered in October, left you bedridden in  late February and took you in April was plenty damn quick.

I remember clearly how at 5:30 in the morning I woke up. I glanced at the clock, I got up and waited for the phone to ring. I was so sure you were gone. I called dad at 8:00, but he told me no, you were still alive, only to call back three hours later with the news. I told this to my sister and brother and father and all of us woke up at 5:30 or within 10 minutes of the time.  No idea what that was.

It was monumentally unfair that after years of trying to have a child, waiting for the adoption that I never had a mother's day when I was both mother and child. You got to meet our Lotus and hold her, but she won't remember you--and I hate that.

You would have loved that I've been working the past year with audiobooks.

I remember your likes and dislikes sharper than when you were alive. I remember your scent and the strong way your hands moved. I remember how you would cut an onion, potato, or apple in the palm of your hand and never use a cutting board. I kept buying you cutting boards for Mother's day, your birthday, Chanukah.  Two of them I found after--unused.

Listing the things I don't miss about you would take a shorter time.

I miss your voice and your assertion that "everything happens for the best." I don't believe it now, anymore than I did then. But I miss you saying it.  

I think what I miss most about missing you is Dad. He's not with you--not yet, and I have some idea on how much work he has had to do not to just will himself to your side. But my strong Papa is gone. He's far more indecisive than I have ever seen him. He's more fearful too-- fearful of driving, fearful of stuff.  By your side he could do anything. The two of you could do anything. I miss that.  

I'm getting along--like you told me to, but you never taught me how to get along without you so I'm winging it most of the time.