Sunday Morning Like Mama

My mom and I hung out Easter morning. 

I think of her every single day. More than once.

I miss her still and though that loss will never fade

it ebbs and flows like the tides. Sometimes crashing like waves

against a sea wall and other times distant and gray on the horizon of 

my day.

Always there though.

Always there. 

Often these last few hard years I have wondered what her advice

to me would sound like. Usually I decide it would sound like 

Keep on going, Honey. 

You don't really have a choice. 

Just do what you need to do. 

You're doing just fine.

And so I keep going. Doing what needs to be done. 

When I grow weary of the going and the doing I feel my soul

looking for her. Reaching and stretching towards her like the arms of my sweet grand-babies reaching towards their own mamas.

My heart is just hoping for a glimpse is all.
Just yearning for a brief moment 

as the child again. 

Easter morning I caught that glimpse when I woke early to get
Sunday lunch started before church. 

Already dressed in my Sunday best 

and wrapped up in one of her aprons I put the 

butter beans on to cook and I almost heard her whisper.

In an instant I flew through years to those Sunday mornings 

when I woke to the sounds of her in the kitchen starting Sunday lunch

even before the rest of us were ready for breakfast.

Just for a moment

I saw her with that same apron over her Sunday dress.

Just for a breath

as my heart stretched towards hers 

I felt her right there beside me.

And my mama held me again. 

It made the day with my own precious angels all the sweeter.

Looking For The Words

This one is for you-my quiet pray-er, real live author and old softball slinging friend. It took many nights of prayers dancing with fears and angels but it is time for me to look for the words again.

It is time to practice what I preach to the 

kindergartners I with whom I spend my days.

We can do hard things.  

Nearly a year and a half away from the coma 

that nearly robbed me of them it remains 

difficult still to move words from my heart to paper.

What once was effortless is now more deliberate and hard

and for almost nineteen months now I have rarely had the

energy to visit these pages.

Laboring so over something once so 

easy can be discouraging and Lord knows I haven't had

the inclination to fight any battles that were optional in

nature. 

The process is much harder now. The words and sentences

hide from me and I spend most of my time here backspacing,

retyping and rewording.

Spelling never my strong suit is now even more

difficult.

Words that once danced from my fingertips to the correct keys of

my computer now spin a little out of control and often require stern

direction to find their way.

It occurs to me though, that I have more to say and however difficult it may be, weakness becomes strength only through hard work of one kind or another.

So maybe I'll come here more often and type and backspace and type and re-type.