Missing Mom....

It's cold and rainy and gray, and it's March and I'm missing our beloved Mom--Demetra. She was here for a few days, just five weeks ago, and before that, she was here for several months, but I miss her. I miss her. Mom is at the home shares with my beautiful, kind, sister and bro-in-law, and I know she prefers being home, in the warmth of south Florida, over the unpredictable weather here in north Georgia, but still, I miss her. I wonder sometimes how I will ever deal with the loss that all of us must face: that of forever losing a parent. I have been shy about even mouthing these words, as it hurts to even imagine such a scenario, yet nearly everyone currently in my life, has lost at least one parent, while my sister and I, are blessed with BOTH of our parents, living, and thriving, despite their harsh, individual, diagnoses...Sis and I are both also blessed with both of our "in-law-parents", too. I have been shy about mouthing these words, because in our American culture, denying death is something we do, every single day. We deny our death, our mortality. We all---perhaps especially me--live as though we have "forever" to accomplish tasks, to meet up with dear friends, to finish writing our play, or finish editing our two books of poems....I try to live by Carpe' Diem--I really do, but the inertia and I suppose--a kind of darkness that has swallowed me up over the past 15 months, has blunted my repeated attempts to feel...indeed, TO BE...productive. I'm hoping Mom will be back up here, before her follow-up in late April, with Cancer Treatment Centers of America. I know this for certain: I felt productive, caring for her. The poetry, was in the doing, in the loving act of cooking for her, assisting her with walking, laughing as we looked over old photographs, crying at the movies ("12 Years A Slave", which we saw shortly after it debuted at a nearby theatre), talking about our old beaus (mine, and hers!). The rain has stopped, but it's still not warm enough here for Mom, yet. I'll light a fire, until she comes back. Peace, kids.