One year of missing you...

Dear Mom,

It’s been one year since you have been gone though it seems just like yesterday. I have gone over in my mind a hundred times what I would write to you today. I truly can’t believe that this happened. Just the day before we were all gathered at our Father’s Day picnic enjoying time as a family and the next day we were all gathered mourning your loss. I am happy and take comfort that everyone got to see you that day.

I have really had a hard time adjusting to my new “role”. You were always there for me. I miss calling you at work. I miss telling you not to mess up the couch. I miss asking you if you want to go to the diner for Saturday morning breakfast. I miss taking you to Target and you getting into that motorized chair. I miss watching American Idol and the Soaps together. I miss your cooking. I miss that silly face that you make.

I have learned that Life doesn’t stop for anything. The world keeps turning and you need to keep up. The day you died and there after there was still laundry to do, a house to clean. The world didn’t stop even though I wanted it to. I just couldn’t understand that while we were back and forth at your hospital bedside that people in the lobby of the hospital were watching television, their world still the same as mine was crashing down. Time stands still for no one.

I don’t have the answers as to why this happened but they say that everything happens for a reason. I may never know that reason or understand the “why”. I do know that you have instilled in me a sense of value. I am everything that I am because of you. I try to carry on your beliefs mixed with your sense of humor.

You will be happy to know that I can cook. I know you knew that but now I actually enjoy cooking and baking. Every time I take out your recipe box and see your writing you are there with me... cooking right by my side.

There were days in the beginning that I would lay in your bed and cry. I try not to cry in front of others so not to upset any one but my tears, my pain, are still so real. I hope one day soon that the tears will be fewer, the smiles more frequent and the memories more vivid. For now, it still hurts too much. “If tears could build a stairway and memories were a lane, I would walk right up to Heaven and bring you home again.”

We didn’t get to say goodbye and no farewell words for spoken. I didn’t get to say that I Love You but only God knows why. My heart still aches in sadness and secret tears still flow. What it meant to lose you, no one will ever know.

I had a stone inscribed with the saying from your prayer card. The stone will be placed in our front garden as a reminder of you. You were the “rock” of this family. The stone reads…”Our family chain is broken, and nothing seems the same: But has God calls us one by one the chain will link again.

I miss and love you with all of my heart and soul. Till we meet again…

Your daughter, Christine