August 1

August 1....my stepson Joseph's birthday.......our Miss Ruby's birthday.....and my mother's birthday. Odd that three such integral and important people in my life shared the same birthday.

I have told my dad and my sisters that my "mother blogs" will be happier now, not the tear jerkers of a year ago. But my mother's birthday....her day....August 1 continues to bring me overwhelming feelings of love and loss and what might have been and worst of all what was.

Caught amidst scattered remembrances of her laughing so hard she cried.....Drew once commented, "Grandmommy smiles so hard she squints" (isn't that a great phrase; good job, Drew)..... I am haunted by remembrances of my mother's final cries to go home, upstairs, to her bed.

But then, I also remember at 16 years old, those teen years when I know I so often disappointed her, looking out from the stage where I had won a hometown high school pageant. The pride and excitement in my mother's face were such that one might have thought I had just been crowned Miss Universe. I guess mothers are like that, right?

Mother had a weak stomach and often when the issues to be dealt with were of the sick children variety, it was Daddy who got the duty call. It was indeed fortunate that my mom was blessed with the physician husband who had seen it all before. But, I recall when so nauseated during my labor with Drew that I couldn't hold my head up, it was Mother there beside my hospital bed, holding my hand while Daddy, my OB-GYN, and even Adrian checked a ballgame score on tv. Note to Dee....I am glad I remembered that one......another blog for another day.

From decades back, I vividly remember Mother's agony as she shared with me the horrifying news that she had accidentally backed over and killed my sweet English Setter Scamp. I remember with equal agony how completely unforgiving I was as we sat at the little round table in the close confines of her Garden City condo and she broke the news to me.

More recently, I and my sisters will recall a Christmas gift of a "fake fur" jacket to my mother. Remember those? And the way she reacted, you might have thought it was mink. Mother broke into one of those squinty smiles Drew had noticed and happily modeled the Target .....that's Targe' of course....coat for us all.

Pastor Joel spoke of prisms during Mother's funeral services. I think again of that description as I have so many times since. My mother's strength, stubborness if you will, versus her weakness and frequent dependence on my dad......my mother's love of clothes and shoes and fashion but the cruel irony of her later near inability to dress in anything other than sweatsuits.......my mother's frequent tardiness but her arrival at Matt's graduation a full hour early.....my mother's sedentary life and yet her childhood chore of watering turkeys (ongoing apologies to my mom that I was so sure in her confusion she had somehow inexplicably inserted herself into an episode of "Little House on the Prarie")....my mother's seeming few friends..... yet her impassioned love of those she had....my mother's unending correction of my/our grammar....my doing the same with my children today.....my mother's oft evident disdain for the kitchen.....mine today.....my mother's fierce devotion to her family.....my lioness like protection of my children.....my mother's love of Clemson and football....my hopes that Drew will attend or even play there.

When did the torch pass? When did I absorb so much of my mom? Why is that suddenly less bad than I once thought it would be? Instead of rebuking the piles of newspapers in her den that drove us all crazy, I now think of how voraciously she read and how much she absorbed of two newspaper publications and numerous magazines every day. I remember the maddening two and a half hour meals because she ate so interminably slowly, but now my wish would be for just one more dinner that might last who knows or who cares how long.

Sunday afternoon I sent Kate off for a few days with Diane. Likely my precious daughter and this one of my beautiful and beloved sisters will be together this Wednesday when Diane's and my mother's, Kate's grandmother's, birthday rolls around. Perhaps this daughter and granddaughter can share an August 1 story, a memory, a laugh, a tear, a "Patism."

We are still missing you, Mother.....still figuring it all out with you gone. But it is getting better. I stood alone for a moment at your grave on Sunday. I know my sisters and our dad had been there earlier, but this was my minute, our minute, yours and mine......our moment in time. Diane, Donna, and I think of you all the time, but never quite so much as on August 1.

Photo by Frank Mottek. A quick post script, I chose this photo for my post, then noticed yesterday, August 1, 2012 there was a full moon. Happy Birthday, Mother.....