Mother's Day has always been hard.
At least for me.
Not because I didn't know how to or want to honor my mother. Far from it. The sun rose and set on her and her loss is still palpable and present even almost 8 years later.
Every year I made sure to spend Mother's Day with Mom (except when in college...but even then it was almost always a chance to 'bring a load home' early. ). I didn't do the normal things every year. We tried to make her breakfast in bed I remember when Betty and I were like 12 and 10...but that just seemed to make more work for her with cleanup/loss of batter and I think she ended up eating Froot Loops in Bed instead. Gifts were all over the place and ranged in usefulness from a coffee mug with something silly on it, to an ash tray I made (that I actually still have) where the bird in the nest had fallen OFF the bowl while it was in the kiln and so sits in the nest 'beak' down, to an Amazon Kindle that I still have even though it is about 9 generations behind and almost useless.
When I got older and was married to my first wife...we found out about 3 years into our marriage that in fact I was infertile. That parenthood for us was going to require a lot of extra steps/finances and some of them almost prohibitively so. When we learned that...Mother's Day became almost a day of mourning for my first wife and I. A reminder that we weren't yet and probably not likely to BE parents. It got to the point where even going to church on Mother's Day for my wife was a trial and so unless I was actually leading worship...we tended not to go.
Then came 2013.
By this point my first marriage had fallen apart and a reconciliation had recently failed, and my Mother had recently had the whipple surgery that at the time we hoped would be life saving. I was living with my parents and my Dad was basically living at Rochester General Hospital, coming home only to sleep and shower every day.
Still...there was a lightness to this day. I had had the foresight to take the day off from my job at Best Buy and my sister and her husband were going to come into the hospital with the kids for the first time to see their Nana. We all knew the odds by this point. We hadn't gotten the 'oncology report' from the procedure...but by this point all of us I think had researched Pancreatic Cancer and with my mother's medical history as far as neutropenia went...I think deep down we all suspected that this could be a fleeting moment. We took this picture...and it was our last full family photo.
Of course...this was also the last Mother's Day I would celebrate with my own mother.
It's weird in some ways. I knew in my heart that this day would eventually have meaning for me again. Maybe it was God giving me some peace about His plan. Maybe it was just me being the hopeful romantic I am at times, or maybe I just couldn't face the idea that as of August 13, 2013...I would no longer have a reason to celebrate Mother's Day.
Even when I started dating Emily and she was also someone who didn't have or particularly want children...a part of me always felt like Mother's Day would become an event again.
Fast forward 8 years and it has.
I'm married again to one of the absolute best friends I have ever had. I've known her more than half my life and we're a good team and she's an amazing partner.
She's also an incredible mother.
She and her first husband (someone I consider a brother in arms lol) had three amazing kids. Nicholas, Isabelle and Matthew. When I came in, Nicholas was just turning 16, Isabelle was 14 and Matthew was 9. Nick and Izzy were fully formed people who I got the privilege of taking time to win over. Matthew being 9 he was my buddy from jump. We're somewhat the same mental age lol.
So for the past 5 years I've had the privilege of being a part of Mother's Day with this woman and her kids. Each year it gets better and better. I'm a part of a family again.
Yesterday was the pinnacle for me.
I woke up sort of feeling sad. I had dreamt of Mom for the first time in awhile and my heart was a little sad when the reality of her loss rushed in as I awoke yesterday. It was Mother's Day and my Mom was gone. However...my bride was here. I worked on the house as we were going to have her parents as well as Nick and Sandy (Wendy's ex-husband and his fiance) for a cookout. It was awesome. Izzy ran the grill, Wendy and I helped keep everyone happy with food and drink, we talked to Nicholas who is still at Oswego till Wednesday and enjoyed the day together.
We made memories.
At times it's still surprising to me. Going from where I was just 2922 days ago, to now is still awe inspiring to me. My world was defined by loss for so long. My marriage, my Mom, in some ways my Dad (moving away), my extended family etc...all things that for so long would serve to be how I defined myself. It was all stripped away through circumstance, life change and in some ways choices I made both good and bad. My world today looks nothing like the world I had known. In a lot of ways it's better. I'm a good Dad. I'm helping to raise three incredible young people and have an impact on their lives. I'm helping an amazing friend and even better woman become all that she can be and I'm even making new friends and reconnecting with some life-long ones I'd lost touch with.
My grandmother once told me an illustration. She'd just been diagnosed with the cancer and I was struggling. Again...averse to change and here was the quintessential super hero to me being ravaged by a disease. It threw me for a loop. One day I was staying at Grandma's and we were talking about some old memories and I said "Grammie...I wish I could just live in those memories. They were such great times.". She looked at me and said "Billy...I'm going to tell you something. Life is kinda like a cruise ship. There are three places to be on a boat really. You can be in the back...looking at where you were and wishing and hoping to somehow get back there sometime. You can sit in the front of the boat and look at where you're going, just anxious to get there and do something. Or you can be in the middle of the boat where the dinners are, and the parties, and the people. You can make new friends, and have new adventures and experience the life in THAT moment. It doesn't lessen the place you were, and the place you're going...well that's just an idea. Billy...I want you to be in the middle."
She was telling me to live my life. I hadn't done that too well really. With my memory being what it is...it's so easy to recall events, people and places I've been that after some time become rose-colored...and live there. When my world crashed down in 2012...I hadn't been able to do that without feeling an incredible sense of loss...so I pushed it out and started looking at where I wanted to be. I dated a ton...I tried to 'recreate' my lost marriage and family with someone else...at no point giving any thought to whether this person was right for me like that. I was just trying to 'piece it all back together...'. It wasn't until I moved out here...that I really started to see that life had passed me by in some ways. I'd miss the party in the middle of the boat...and now I find myself just happy to be where I am.
There's still pain. I miss my Mom every day. There's so much I wish I could tell her. I wish she could have met my kids, seen me as a Dad and spoiled the hell out of my kids. I still get homesick for the '585'...my church family, my extended family, my friends, my old colleagues...but I also know that I'm where I'm supposed to be now. I'm living a life for myself...and for my family. I'm not perfect and still learning...but we're doing it.
Yesterday was amazing. Spending time with my new family...helping one of ours through what was probably a tough day (Sandy lost her mother earlier this year...she's still in the 'year of firsts'...and Wendy and I both knew that what she needed was a day with tons of people around)...and making memories with the kids as well as the memories Wendy gets to make with her parents and Aunt.
I miss the old Mother's Days...and the woman who would define it for me...but I find myself eager to see what we do next year.
I haven't been able to say that in almost 8 years now...
Thanks for reading.
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