Thanksgiving

I'm a day out, but it seemed appropriate to ride on the wave of gratitude at the moment for my own post of thanks.  I have a lot for which I am grateful for, and I would like to return to a more intentional practice of daily gratitude again, but that's a whole other post.

I'll be away with work all day tomorrow which also happens to be the third anniversary of my mother's passing.  I can't believe it's been three years already, but at the same time, it feels like so much longer since my mother disappeared from her body.  I read this article today and it made me cry.  Such a poignant truth about life and love, the beauty and the cruelty mixed together - because watching someone we love suffer and die is probably the hardest thing we have to do in life.

I still remember her last evening on earth.  The room was lit only from the light in the hall,  casting a dark orange glow right over my mother, whilst the machine feeding her pumped to a steady rhythm.  Cam was in another room trying to catch a little bit of sleep.  I remember sitting in the armchair, the same one I had been sitting in for the last 16 months when I came to read to her each day, listening to her struggle desperately for each shallow breath.  I remember thinking it felt so different at 3am, when the usually busy corridors were empty,  and the normal hum of activity, silent.  I remember looking at my mother, knowing the end was near, and in some ways, hoping peace and dignity would finally be hers.  I remember wiping blood that would fall from the corner of her mouth every time she would contract, not knowing if it was from pain or just her body slowly shutting down.  I remember repeating Oriah over and over again in my head, "I want to know if you can sit through pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it, or fade it, or fix it" like a mantra, knowing that was all I could do.

It was the longest and shortest night of my life. 

But I am so grateful I was able to be there.  I am so grateful that despite all my other failings as a daughter (and I have many) that, in her final hours, my mother knew she wasn't alone.  I am grateful for the life I have which enabled me to visit her daily.  I am grateful for being married to a man who loved my mother like his own.  I am grateful that every day we remember my mother through her little ways and sayings.  And we laugh.  We share memories of her which makes us laugh, because that is how she would want to be remembered.

And most of all, I am grateful to still love and be loved. 

*I made the slideshow above not long after her passing, and the song is Human by The Killers, one of her favourites, and the same song played at her funeral.