I talked to you today....

but it wasn't the same. Your spirit is gone and you don't remember me well, or anything about my life for that matter. I was afraid for years and years that you would leave me before I was ready. It's true, I'm not ready for you to go, but I'm ready for you to be at peace and out of the constant pain that you spent half your life in. I think that hurts worse to have you on this earth but gone at the same time. What purpose does it serve to have you lying on a couch hurting all the time and wishing it would end. These are the times when I say to myself...."where is this God you all speak of?" And to think someone's life will be taken way too soon on this day that you are hoping to just go home.

I miss you so much. I wish that I still had our weekly talks where you listened to me babble on about this or that. I want to share the little things with you about my every day, the little things my daughters do that make me laugh but I can not. I miss our summer visits. I should have spent more time sitting at your table playing Skip-Bo or Yahtzee. I'm sorry that I didn't.

I've been mad at you for parts of my life, not understanding you in the least because you kept your feelings guarded. Not because you didn't want to share but perhaps felt like it didn't matter what you felt, life wasn't going to change its circumstances just because of feelings. You never complained even though you were hurting most of the days I was with you. The worst memories of your pain was when you had a case of shingles. It was as if your arthritis melted away and another, more intense pain crippled you to your bed. You didn't get out of it for what seemed like forever to a little girl who just wished her mama felt better.

I loved you so much as a girl. You were my security blanket and my hiding place. I never wanted to leave your side, even at night I slept beside you for years and years. It would be nice to go back and peek in a window at the simple life we led at that time. Just you and me and I liked it that way. Just you and me.

I surely love you now as well. I hurt inside, there's such a large chunk of me missing without you in my life. My heart aches like your tired body. I don't know how to make it stop. Maybe time will heal, maybe? I don't think anyone will miss you as much as me.

I love you, Mom.