Happy Mom!

It's Sunday, and Mother's day. I miss Mom.

Yesterday was the 9th anniversary of her passing and it was a tough day. I look around the house and see things the remind me of her - things I do now that I remember her doing.

There are little things like color and furniture styles and bigger things like the impulse to decide at breakfast that it would be a good day to go for a ride instead of doing the chores around the house. I will admit there is my Dad as an influence in my house also. That would be the packratedness of the rooms, though I am trying to squelch that and clean things up. My sister and I talked about this and she was saying that she feels her gardening is a trait she got from mom. We would have large vegatable gardens in the back every year. Mom would use the veggies for meals but also would do canning of the tomatoes and such for the rest of the year.

My sister went to visit my Mom's grave yesterday and put some flowers there. Mom is buried in the same cemetary as my grandfather and grandmother and several other generations from that side of the family. Today, while cleaning and going through some boxes that had never been sorted out from our move, I found a small tin that has some of my Mom's ashes in it. I looked at it and thought about taking them up to the Susquenhanna River near Harrisburg where she was born. She told me that it was on that river in a canoe on a sunday afternoon that my dad proposed to her. Then I thought about my tattoo with some of Jim's ashes in it and now am considering maybe a small tattoo in her honor with some of her ashes. I have to think about it for a bit to figure out just what would be right.

The photos I have looked at today of my Mom were fun. I pulled out an album that had some from her childhood - it is interesting to compare pictures of her with those of me, my sister and my nieces. There are family resemblances and that is comforting.

Happy Mother's Day!