Missing Sweet Jean

Today is the birthday of my amazing mother-in-law.  We haven't been able to hear her infectious laugh or have long talks with her in her den in over four years, but we think about her every day.  I doubt many people are as lucky as I was when it comes to in-laws.  I hit the jackpot, to be sure!

Tim's mom, Jean, (mostly referred to as Nanny in our house) quit suffering right before Christmas in 2008, but there are little pieces of her everywhere.  I couldn't have loved her more if she were my own Mom, and I thank God for allowing us to be family.

I wrote this just after she died, and it seemed a fitting tribute for her birthday.

My Tribute to Nanny

In December the world changed.  We lost our “Nanny”, and everything seems different now.  There is a welcoming smile and a fun laugh and two twinkling eyes that are no longer present here, and so the world is missing something special. 

It is hard for me to believe that I have only known Tim’s mother for eleven years, for it seems that she has been part of my life always.  I remember the day I met her, but I don’t ever remember a time that I did not feel close to her.  Somehow, upon meeting Jean Graham, you knew that you were known, that you were welcomed and that you were loved.  I am forever changed by that knowledge, and I thank God that my children knew that, too. 

While we begin to figure out life without Nanny, I have spent hours and hours remembering my favorite things about her, my funniest recollections, and my favorite memories.  I remember exact moments – like the sound of her voice when we called to say that we were engaged or her entrance into the hospital room when Molly was born, coming out of her heavy sweater, handing over her purse, running to the bed and saying, “Give me that baby!”  But I remember predictable moments, too, that happened again and again.  I know the wide-eyed look, as she peered  over the back of her chair when we entered the back door, and I hear her saying, “Come in the house.”  I remember the look in her eyes and the feel of her hands as she settled herself, and told me just where to put the baby in her lap.  I remember the laugh, again and again, and I remember so many fun times around the table playing whichever game we happened to be playing at the time.  I remember her patience with my children – that she had as much time as needed to wait for them to figure out a card game or to trample dirt through the living room or to take half of the kitchen ware into the yard to make “pies” and “cakes.”  I will forever remember that everyone in town, it seems, called to check in with her daily, and I hope I can always hear in my mind the way she said, “MmmmmHello” as she answered the phone. 

What I will miss most, though, is harder to describe, and I suspect that many others will miss the same. What I will miss most is the unspoken understanding that I shared with her.  It is not easy to explain, but it was very easy to feel.  From the moment we met, I felt that we shared some special secret, some special way of knowing what the other was thinking.  I treasure the talks we shared, the looks we exchanged and the times we could not stop laughing about things that probably were not even that funny.  So often, I had the sense and the assurance that she knew what was going on with me, what I was thinking, what I was wishing.  I treasure the simple moments we shared in the living room – I was always on the couch and she was always in her  chair – and it was always easy. 

So that, I guess, was one of her greatest gifts to us all.  She made things easy.  It was easy to be known by her, it was easy to be loved by her, it was easy to be comforted by her, and it was easy to feel happy with her.  I am forever changed by her and by the love and the life that she and Granddaddy built together.  It has been easy to be their daughter-in-law and one of the great blessings of my life. There will never be a time that I don’t miss Nanny, but I am thankful for all of the pieces of her that I see in my children and for the times that Tim sounds just like her.   And every now and then I smile, hoping that she is laughing in the middle of the best game of “Hand and Foot” ever.  I love you, Nan

The Wednesday Pop - Vol. 5 . . . you've got to laugh

Most of you know that I'm devoting Wednesdays this year to telling stories about my Dad.  I came to the conclusion that this was a good idea when I started realizing how very much I had to say about him.  Hope you're enjoying The Wednesday Pop.  I guess I shouldn't claim to have the best Dad ever, but . . . well, I do.

I'm enjoying this regular place to recollect and give him some overdue thanks and think about ways that my parenting (and maybe yours) could be enriched by looking at how my Dad parents.  Needless to say, I've been thinking back a bunch lately, remembering old times and recalling facts from days gone by.  I keep being reminding that my Dad has always been quick to laugh, and I'm thankful for that.  He isn't a silly guy when it's time to be serious, but he has always taught us how to laugh.  Dad doesn't teach in lectures, but he shows his lessons over time by the way he lives.  As time goes by, I grow more and more thankful for every occasion to laugh - don't you?

Finding the joy in moments is such a gift, and I realize now that Dad has been showing us how to do that for years.  We did a lot of laughing as kids, and we do a lot of it now.  There were certainly plenty of serious times when laughing wasn't appropriate, but I'm thinking back about the many ways that Dad creates opportunities to laugh, both at life and at ourselves.  I'm thankful.

So, today I give you these tips on parenting from the 'how my Dad does it' playbook:

• Laugh at yourself whenever you can.  It's good for kids to see that parents goof up and it's awesome when they see us being okay with it.
• Make up a ridiculous language with nothing at all decipherable and speak it with your children often.  The crazier, the better, so go for it.  If you can also do strange things with your eyebrows, it's even better.  As you speak this malarky, your child learns about the magic of imagination and sees, too, that having fun with him or her is always more fun than just about everything else!
• Make up silly stories and crazy words and far-fetched tall tales.  It's fun,  makes everyone giggle and creates learning and trust out of fun moments.
• Take winning and losing with lightness and ease.  Laughing about doing absolutely horrible in a card game is an invaluable lesson for your child.
• Be willing to hear, revel in and laugh at your children's stories again and again and again.  It tells them over and over how very important they are and teaches them about speaking their mind and getting their point across.  
• Call your children by the silliest names, even if it's only the two of you that get it.  Having a pet name says I love you and I love laughing with you.

I'm thankful for laughing in this crazy, mixed-up world, and I'm thankful for a Dad who is still laughing with me!

The first day of a trip that began in 1985 . . .

Later today, I'll put my oldest daughter on a plane to Ireland.  She's not a very old daughter, either!  She's twelve and she (and the rest of us) struck gold on grandparents.  My folks and my daughter, Molly Murphy Graham, will board a big ole Delta plane and cross the ocean.  (It's amazing how much bigger that ocean gets when your child is about to cross it.)

Molly leaves on her trip today, though she has little knowledge that it actually started almost thirty years ago.  Let me explain . . .

My Dad and step-mother are cool.  I've said this before.  I'll say it again.  It's probably rare for children to say this of their parents, but they are cooler than me.  They've always been that way, and it's an unbelievable coo for all of us.  They do neat stuff.  They know interesting people.  They go to cool places.  You get the picture.

Back in the eighties,  they did one of those cool things they do.  I didn't think much about it, as they were always busy doing cool things.  I had no idea their little endeavor would change my life.   They went for a visit in Ireland, which is a must if you are a 'Murphy'.  They don't do things like other people, though, so they went with the FRIENDSHIP FORCE, a non-profit organization which helps folks from different parts of the world learn about other cultures through extended visits.

As luck would have it, the woman who was to be their host would have to bow out of the program because of an illness in the family.  Pop and Baba (my folks) were then placed with a young family in Dundalk.  John and Mary, and their two tiny sons, had agreed to host a Friendship Force trip, as John's mother and aunt had recently returned from their own Boston adventure with the program.  (John also has a parent who does weird and cool things like Pop and Baba - she's part of the story, too.  Just wait.)

So . . . Pop and Baba spent an amazing, lovely, fun-filled time in DUNDALK, County Louth, Ireland. At the time, they knew it to be a wonderful trip with precious new friends.  They couldn't have known then what it all meant.

What it meant was that the Murphys of Atlanta, Georgia, and all of their family and friends would forever be linked with the Quinlivans of Dundalk, Ireland.  It meant that the two families became one, our worlds got smaller.

I know there was time in my life when the Quinlivans weren't in my family, but it's hard to imagine.  I met them first a year or so after Pop and Baba's trip, when the Quinlivans (with their new baby son) came into Dublin to meet me at a hotel where I was staying on a blitz trip of the British Isles.  After that day, we were forever joined.

The Murphys of Atlanta 'friendship forcing' with the Quinlivans of Ireland was the catalyst in one of the most meaningful connections I have ever known.  It's hard to explain.  We are lucky, to be sure.

The bonding of these two families has meant multiple trips from the state of Georgia to a far away country about the size of the state of Georgia.  It has meant multiple trips to Ireland, getting to know our 'cousins' there and hours and hours and hours of laughs.  It has meant card games and dice games that couldn't be explained to outsiders, picnics of only sweets in the Irish country side and sledding in Piedmont park together on pieces of linoleum.  It has meant praying about the family in the other country and holding each other's hearts in ours when one or the other of us has been struck with sadness.

It has meant trip after trip after trip after trip to American electronic stores for the Qs to purchase the next best gadget and it has meant the moments when dear Maura, John's mother, taught me to make Irish bread late one Irish afternoon in John and Mary's kitchen.  It has meant that dear Briege, Mary's sister, is also my sister, and it has meant that I can talk her into some crazy fifteen mile walk from Dingle, in the west of Ireland, to somewhere where the bus stopped running to bring us back when we were finished.

It has meant that there was a big wedding party in Atlanta when Maura met up with and fell in love with her high school sweet heart, Seamus and they married.  It has meant that we have all traveled together, spent a week on the South Carolina coast together, cried together, talked quietly on the porch together, danced at weddings together, visited extended family together, seen the sights together, sang together, ridden subways together, boarded trains together, and been stuffed together into cars that could only be compared to the Volkswagen stuffing fad of years ago.

We are family.  It's as simple as that.  We don't talk much, we are separated by a great big ocean, but we couldn't be closer.

When I visited with the Quinlivans for the first time after an accident in England that killed my mother, John and Mary and all of the rest, were the family I needed.  I wasn't sure I would drive again in that part of the world, but John handled that for me.  On a family drive into Dublin from their home - with little discussion and a whole lot of love and trust - John pulled over, got out and rounded the car to get me out and ask me to drive.  I did.  It was okay.  See what I mean?  Family.

The Quinlivans and Company were here for my wedding, and they brought the 'gifts' to the altar for the Eucharist.  And now . . . my daughter will be with them to see their oldest son, Karl, get married.  I knew Karl and Marc and Colin when they were tiny babies and she will see them as adults.  She will be there to party with the family, meet the newest members and celebrate the love between us all.

She is in for the adventure of a lifetime.  I am thankful beyond measure.  As I write this post, I am remembering something from a couple of weeks ago.  After hearing about this trip, an acquaintance looked at me and asked, "How could you let her go so far away?"

WHAT?  WHAT?  How could I NOT let her?  How could I keep her from knowing a connection that few folks on this swirling blue and green planet will ever know?  How could I keep her from the other part of her family?

I will have a lump in my throat when she boards that plane.  I will be nervous as I watch the tiny plane on the flight-tracker radar on my computer screen.  I will miss her.  It will be a long sixteen days.
But I love her too much to allow her to miss what she is flying into - her other family.  A girl with grandparents that grant these kinds of wishes is a lucky girl.  A girl who learns about a love that spans an ocean is a lucky one.  She won't ever be the same after this trip, and I could not be happier.

Trips change us.  A weekend get-away or a stroll down a new street or a dream vacation in another land - they all live in us forever.  My Molly Murphy is about to have the first installment of a lesson I hope she'll be learning as long as she lives.  She is close to feeling things she has never felt, seeing things she has never seen and doing it all with people who couldn't love her more.

God bless parents who are cool and do out of the ordinary things and family from far away and laughter between people who adore one another.

And God bless the FORCE of FRIENDSHIP!

Safe travels, Molly, Pop and Baba.

List 22 - Lessons learned from the yearly get away

I'm lucky.  This weekend is the occasion of a yearly get together with friends unlike any others.  A few years ago, my friend, Cherie, invited a bunch of us to join her at her family's cabin up in Hayesville, NC.  It took us about 2 seconds to revert back to our comfort with each other that we had first enjoyed forty years ago!  (Wow, that makes me sound old.)

Not surprisingly, the special time has become a yearly tradition.  I wouldn't miss it for the world.  We arrive at different times, from various places, with completely different life stories.  But, when we assemble on the porch, none of that matters at all.  I've learned a lot from them.  I've laughed a lot.  I've been thankful more than I ever could have thought for these friendships started when I was just beginning on life's journey.  I highly recommend this practice!

I ask the 'girls' to help with today's list.  Not being ones to shy away from conversation, I did not have to ask twice.  They were quick to throw out their suggestions on some of what we have learned in our yearly visit.

Here's today's list . . . Lessons we have learned from old friends getting together:

1. You need a porch.
2. No matter how close you feel, it's still best to steer clear of politics and religion.
3. Laughter is good - really good.  Diapers are optional.
4. Our time together is loud.
5. Sometimes we remember things from the past differently - no problem.
6. Pajamas are fine at any hour.  No one cares how you look.
7. There is a lot to recycle when our weekend is over.
8. Our new tradition of renting the pontoon boat is more conducive to our good time than was the yearly hike.
9. There is always a friend behind you to push you up the pontoon ladder.
10. Old music is good.
11. Old memories never fade - but lots of them get funnier!
12. Facebook conversations, re-tellings of the weekend, are unintelligible to folks who weren't present.
13. Sadly, we moved into short conversations about reading glasses.
14. Ruminating is good.
15. We've established a rug of truth - you don't have to stand on it if you don't want.
16. All that really matters is being nice.
17. Everything with us ends in a laugh.
18. We are who we are.  We're fine with that.  
19. We've made a tentative plan to move to Bab's house at the lake when we are old.  We will drink heavily, so we'll wear shock collars to keep us from falling into the water unattended.  We'll pool our money for our own cabana boy.  
20. In conclusion, we have a question:  Why is it that alcohol can kill brain cells and not fat cells?

Have a good weekend, everyone.  I know I will.  I give thanks to God for these friends, these laughs and the continued goodness of really being known by others.  

Mother, Daughter, Love and Laughs

You all know I love my job.  To follow are a few reasons why . . .

It's special to spend time with good people - sometimes people you've known a long time - and capture some of their fun and love to preserve forever.  What a time I had with these two . . . an awesome Mama and her daughter home from college.  I've watched Madelyn grow up and photographing the beautiful young woman she has become was a delight.

I'll post a few of the beautiful photos and I'm making a point to include some of the craziness, the tenderness, the laughs and the touches, too.  Those are some of the best parts!  I love to look for the hand holding and one looking into the other's eyes and those devilish looks when they are having fun together.

I hope these photos will serve as a remembrance for both of them of the incredibly special bond they share.

Feeling thankful for good people, good times and the ever-practicing eye of a photographer . . .

(And . . . did I mention the little run-in with the goose family?) 

I think you can see from the following few photos that Madelyn and Mother Goose 

weren't happy to see each other!  You just must love location surprises!

The get-away shot had to be included!

Here's to Mamas and their babies and to enjoying the moment!

Check the gallery page on my website for the complete set of photographs:

http://deanagrahamphotography.com

Laughing out loud . . .

A few days ago I ran across a quote by one of my favorite authors.  The quote was at the bottom of a good friend's email, and I almost missed it.  I sure am glad I didn't.  Barbara Kingsolver is the author, and if you have not read her books, I urge you to have a look.  She has written much, with varied subjects and themes, short stories, non-fiction, a bit of everything.  Her book, The Poisonwood Bible, is definitely one of my favorites.

Oh, but the quote . . .

It's completely usual for me to get up in the morning, take a look around, and laugh out loud.


You cannot know how much I love that.  I laughed out loud when I read it and a zillion memories came rushing back.  As a parent, one never knows what one will wake up to - especially after the children begin waking up before you on the weekends.  It's never a dull moment; I can assure you that.

This past Sunday morning, I woke up last (no surprise) and was more than delighted to see that the children were almost completely ready for church (surprise).  It was a miracle in itself.  And then they all began to explain that they had even finished breakfast.  The laughing out loud came when Harry (age 8) proudly stated, "I just finished the best BBQ sandwich ever."  I laughed, then I thought about crying, then I hoped no one else would find out, then I decided:

1. He was showing his responsibility by foraging and preparing his own breakfast.
2. He was happy.
3. His meal contained one serving from the wheat group and one serving from the protein group.
4. I am mother of the year once again.

Just a few days before I found the Kingsolver quote, I found this on my dresser when I awoke.  I cannot explain it.  I don't really think it means anything.  I believe it was just one of those things that one might find sitting around in a house with three imaginative children.  Again, I laughed, and then I did what I always do when I discover a new oddity - I wondered what in the world was on the funny little mind of the person who arranged this peculiar table decor.  

Was it to signify:

• Mama, I decided I do want to go to swim practice tonight?
• I'd like to learn a bit more about Amelia Earhart?
• Has anyone seen a body to go with this head?

I'm just not sure.  Who knows.

I say, keep it coming.  Bring it on.  Keep me thinking.  Keep me laughing.

And now, we must announce the winner for yesterday's WHAT IS IT contest!

Good work, you guys!  I thought I had you fooled, but I didn't trick too many of you.  

This was the photo:

(Just for the record, all of you Smarty Pants, I never saw the bug until you pointed it out!)

Here is what it was:

Nicely done, folks.  Thanks for playing!  The winner of this week's free photo session is Heather K.!

We'll go again next Monday!

Sweet, sweet smiles . . .

Meet my precious friends, Gavin and Gracie.

I've said it before, and I'm sure I'll say it again . . . I am a lucky photographer!

Often I find myself photographing folks I know well, and these two I have known as long as they've been on this earth.  I've been fortunate to share many special moments with these two precious souls - I've laughed with them and learned with them.

I adore photographing children and anticipating what they might do next, what will make them laugh, when they will glance at one another.

Children keep things moving; and young ones with this much personality are a blast to capture in action!

(I just couldn't 'erase' this scuffed elbow - it seemed to lend to the personality of her look!)

This shoot was made even more special because of what this sweet Gracie was doing the following day  - she was hours away from having her hair cut and donated to help children going through cancer treatment.

Portraits of children are made in the eyes, and I love Gracie's eyes in this photo.  Each time I look at this photo, I find myself drawn right into those familiar, beautiful eyes.

Those eyes . . . again.  I feel like Gavin could start talking to me when I see him here!

I love photos that seem life-like.  This one did!  I have seen Gracie make this face so many times; and when I look at this photo, I feel like I can hear her giggle.

I like that!

List Fourteen - 10 things I remembered at the amusement park.

Ten things I remembered while we were at the amusement park:

1. Everyone laughs, screams, whoops and hollers in the same language.  
2. Getting a little bit scared is really fun and probably good for you, from time to time.
3. There comes a time when going around and around and around and around and around in a circle, while spinning around and around and around and around one's self is not a smart thing.  
4. Sometimes you get a real surprise and the souvenir cup is 50% off.
5. There can be too much of a good thing - all the soda one can drink in a day doesn't make you feel good.
6. Don't judge anything before you try it.  (Heights might actually feel higher than they look from the ground.)
7. Go-carts never get old.
8. Hearing screams of delight makes a person feel lighter.
9. It always helps to hold hands when you feel a little nervous.
10. The world and its people look really, really happy and friendly from above.  It's good to get a bird's eye view every now and then.

List Twelve - a few more things about Mary George

 

What a week this has been - you have been amazing companions on this journey, and I am thankful for your support and interest.  It is fun to consider that Mom can make this much splash after twenty one years!  As I've said this week, one of Mom's best gifts was her ability to teach us all through story; so I guess it is no surprise that her voice is still alive.

I've heard from so many folks this week, from distant family members to old friends to Mom's former students.  You've remembered the stories with me, and that means so much.  I hope Mom knows about all of our remembering and laughing - I bet she does.

I couldn't tell it all in just five posts - that's not possible.  There is much to tell; there are wonderful stories and hard times, unforgettable moments and moments of sadness.  Mom's life was like ours, a terrific mixture of so much.  She struggled and laughed and worked and cried and loved and learned like us all.  That's a picture too large to paint with just the words on a blog, but it has been a wonderful gift to attempt to describe her, to give you the essence of who she was.

 

There are still many stories left to tell, and I believe I will tell them.  I'll keep searching and remembering, and from time to time, I'll let Mom speak again on this blog.  I'm convinced she still has much to tell and to teach.  Fridays are 'list days' on Press Pause, so today's list will be a few things that I didn't get to tell you about my mother.

1. Mom's interesting name was actually quiet common when she was a child in South Georgia.  It was a custom to be called by a combination of your mother and father's first names.  She WAS NOT the only Mary George in her little town of Douglas, Georgia.  She told me once that she and the others with the same name instituted the Mary George Club, and it came as no surprise that she was the president of the club!  
2. Mom tried everything in her growing up years.  My grandfather used to tell me that Mom took lessons on everything, looking for her niche.  She tried it all, from horseback riding to trumpet playing and everything in between!  She was interested in politics from her beginning and specialized in 'oratory.'  During the Sibley Commission that toured the state of Georgia (aiming to keep schools segregated, but offering both sides to speak their minds), Mom was a speaker on behalf of integrating the public schools.  That was the start of life to be filled with speaking out for equal rights for everyone, an ideal she held always.  Mom was not afraid to speak her mind, and she continued to feel that it was her duty to use her talents, her voice and her story-telling to help make things right.
3. There are many times I've been proud of my mother; one of those occasions was when she quit her teaching job of years in Jackson County, Georgia when there was a large book-banning policy implemented.  In my opinion, the letter she wrote in defense of her decisions and the need to have systems in place to allow qualified professionals the autonomy to make decisions on behalf of their students, was among her best writing.  She felt it was wrong for anyone to let fear keep them from speaking out for the right thing.  
4. I didn't get to tell you about the time that Mom tried to display her penchant for the dramatic in a play production at LaGrange College - she described it so well, using her voice to foreshadow her impending doom . . . she took to the stage, reciting her lines and she felt that a dramatic leap towards stage front would mark her place in the play.  I will interject here that dance was not among Mom's best talents.  She ran towards the audience, neared the stage edge and did her best, most athletic and beautiful leap with all that she had.  Unfortunately, she soared into the air and then off the stage, into the laps of the unassuming folks in the front row.  I wish you could hear her tell about the number of people who tried to help to force her legs back together.  It was her best 'split' ever, and she finally had to be awkwardly belted into a wheel chair, and rolled away to the infirmary, one leg still forcefully pointing towards the heavens!  Like other moments, she would always laugh the loudest as she recounted her doomed performance!
5. I did not get to tell you about how her two favorite classes to teach were the very highest level students and the very lowest level ones or about how she set up systems to bring the two together.  I'd like for you to hear the parents of her students describing how they, too, read the assigned books and had their children (Mom's students) explain what Ms. Murphy had revealed in the class discussion that day.  
6. I didn't have the time to tell you about the nights she spent at her sewing machine, making costumes for our ballets, the likes of which you cannot imagine.  When Mom heard about what needed to be made, she didn't spend any time explaining what she didn't know how to do - she just got busy, inventing, creating, learning how to do what was required.   She often seemed like a bit of a magician, just like she described her grandmother Jones.  She could take ten random items and use them to create a costume that was then used by the Atlanta Ballet in The Nutcracker!
7. You read about her sense of adventure and her need to search for the answers; but I didn't get to tell you about the time she tip-toed alone through a pasture in the hills of England, suddenly to realize that she was being chased by a humongous black bull!  And I didn't get to share about a crazy search she set out on in Saint Simon's Island, where she poked through weeds and debris, searching for answers to historical questions - she loved to tell about how she quietly plodded along, nearing a dilapidated old slave cabin, concentrating on what she was searching for, when suddenly she startled a large, antlered deer who chased her back to her car at the edge of the brush.  Guess what?  She waited for a bit to catch her breath and for the deer to find another interest and then she got back to the adventure at hand and went back on her hunt!
8. You might not know about Mom's move to Saint Simon's Island; a move that marked a re-starting of her life.  She rediscovered herself there, spent time with folks she loved and began to make her mark on a new group of people.  I always felt that buying her new house there, the house that was just hers, was a wonderful beginning for her.  She had dreamed of living on the island, and she loved her time there.  During her first summer, Mom decided to use her preparation time completing a research paper, an exercise that she would share with her new students to walk them along the steps of constructing the perfect paper.  She opted to research the history of the area where she lived, to look deeper into the lives and stories of the people who had resided there years before.  She loved the investigation and found herself contacting descendants of early islanders and digging up old stories that needed to be told.  At one point, a friend read her 'paper' and exclaimed that she thought that Mom just might know more about that area of the island than anyone else ever had.  The friend took Mom's work to acclaimed writer, Eugenia Price, who agreed.  Mom struck up a relationship with Ms. Price and many other area authors, and they put her in contact with Mildred Huie, a well-loved artist and historian of the area.  Mildred asked Mom to write the last book of a series she had begun years before with a friend who had passed away.  The duo had written books on each of the main plantations of the island and had only the Kelvin Grove area to write.  It was the perfect match!  Mom and Mildred combined their efforts and published a book about Kelvin Grove, the East Beach and King and Prince area of the island.  It was an amazing experience for Mom and for all of us.  I still have some copies from the last publishing of the book - if you'd like one, let me know.  I'd be happy to send you one, compliments of Mom.
9. And I didn't tell you about the other sides of her life; those other sides we all have.  I didn't describe her struggles, the times she didn't feel she measured up.  She was human, like the rest of us, and she had the same dark times that the rest of us do.  She suffered with depression during parts of her adult life and she and I spent years arguing with one another, screaming out our anger at each other and saying things I know we both regretted later.   She came out on the other side of her bitterness and sadness felt during her middle years and, together, the two of us came out of our arguing and got to be real friends in her last years.  We had always had fun together; but in the last few years of her life, we were able to truly enjoy each other, to notice the good in each other and to ignore the ways that we had hurt each other in the times we did not get along.  I thank God for that.  I remember looking out the plane window on the trip to England in l99l and realizing that my Mom and I truly appreciated each other, that we were adults who respected the other, who adored each other.  I am eternally grateful.
10. Mom died on a trip to England in 1991.  I accompanied her on the trip, along with fifteen or so of her past students.  Mom had spent the previous summer in the Cambridge College summer program and had been invited back to serve as a tutor in the program.  Many of her former students, hearing that Mom would be there, registered for the program to share the experience with Mom, and we all traveled there for the summer.  Mom had some health problems and had been urged by her doctor not to make the trip.  Her doctors were puzzled about what was wrong with her, and they wanted the summer to try to make a diagnosis.  Mom wouldn't hear of cancelling the trip.  We wondered, all of us, in the months leading up to our departure, why she was so insistent that the trip take place.  We urged her to change her mind and assured her that we could do the entire experience the following year.  She was insistent that we go along with our plans.                                                                                                                                     We set out for England, for our summer adventure, with that marvelous group of young people.  We laughed often with Mom, about how giddy she seemed about the whole thing.  To her, experiencing her promised land with one of her daughters and all of those precious students was a life-changing event.  She reveled in every day, every adventure and every moment that she sparked the imagination of one of her students.  It was an unbelievably special time.  During the week, we lived in a dorm on the campus, pretending that we were in college in England!  Each weekend we took trips by train or car to areas that Mom had investigated and wanted us to see.  She took us to each of the areas in T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets (except for the one in the states) and we followed behind her, laughing when she did something crazy and listening intently when she read to us the words she loved so much.                                         Mid-way through the trip, Mom and I and two others headed out to spend the weekend in a cottage tucked away in the Cotswalds, a particular cabin she knew to be important in the literary genius of Britain.                                                                                                              On Mom's last day on this earth, we experienced magic unlike any other on the trip.  Mom co-piloted directions as I drove us to Little Gidding, a community of Anglican prayer which sheltered the king during the war, fifteen miles from Cambridge.  Looking back through the very book that Mom read from on the day - the book that still has the pressed rose given to her by a student on our day at East Coker, another of the four quartets in Eliot's final published poem - I can see clearly now how the many pieces of Mom's life culminated there, in that place, on that day.                                                                                                                     Though my mother lived and thrived in many places on this earth, that day we stood in a place that contained so much of what she believed about her earthly life and Mom told us the stories and read the words that she felt best described life's meaning.  She was connected to that space in a way I cannot understand, in a way I cannot explain, and I have no doubt that there was a reason we visited there on that day.  As I write this, I feel thankful to be telling another part of her story.  It is sad, to be sure, but today I feel a vast sense of awe about it all.  Today I am thankful.  I'm holding Mom's tattered copy of Eliot's book, and I am glad I'm telling this story.  It's one of the stories of Mom and one of the stories about me and one of the stories of all of the other people who have read the same words, prayed the same prayers.                                     On my mother's last afternoon, she led her three fledgling ducklings into the chapel at Little Gidding and to a grave stone just down the lane,  a space where she had never worshiped and a place where she had always worshiped, and she read us these words . . .                                

You are here to kneel where prayer has been valid.  And prayer is more than an order of words, the conscious occupation of the praying mind, or the sound of the voice praying.  And what the dead had no speech for, when living, they can tell you, being dead:  the communication of the dead is tongued with fire beyond the language of the living. . .        

. . . and that is where we start.  We die with the dying:  See, they depart, and we go with them.  We are born with the dead:  See, they return, and bring us with them.  The moment of the rose and the moment of the yew-tree are of equal duration.  

. . . We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.  Through the unknown, remembered gate when the last of earth left to discover is that which was the beginning; at the source of the longest river the voice of the hidden waterfall.  

. . . And all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well when the tongues of flame are in-folded into the crowned knot of fire and the fire and the rose are one.  

We left Little Gidding on our way to the Cotwalds and detoured a bit for a visit to Coventry, a place my Mom and I had always wanted to visit.  Much of the efforts of Mom's life were for peace, for her great hope that this world's different people would one day live together in a loving way.  Coventry was the perfect illustration of those beliefs, a town with an active cathedral which has become known the world-over for it's peace and reconciliation efforts.

On the night of 14 November 1940, the city of Coventry was devastated by bombs dropped by the Luftwaffe.  The Cathedral burned with the city, having been hit by several incendiary devices.

The decision to rebuild the cathedral was taken the morning after its destruction.  Rebuilding would not be an act of defiance, but rather a sign of faith, trust and hope for the future of the world. 

Shortly after the destruction, the cathedral stonemason, Jock Forbes, noticed that two of the charred medieval roof timbers had fallen in the shape of a cross.  He set them up in the ruins where they were later placed on an altar of rubble with the moving words 'Father Forgive' inscribed on the Sanctuary wall.

In this space of horrid destruction, the scene is now one of complete peace.  The altar area of that bombed cathedral still stands and you move through that area to enter the new worship area.  It is moving beyond words.   That Friday afternoon we arrived there, laughing and enjoying our time together.  Our jovial celebration quickly turned to a silent time of prayer when we entered that amazing place.  We no longer talked and each of us quietly spoke inside ourselves.  I remember watching Mom as she made her way to that great sanctuary of reconcile, that moving testament to forgiveness.  She walked slowly, and I actually felt all the times of her life when she had preached and spoke and written the ways of peace - I could see her teaching her students lessons far past any that they would face on an AP test, I could imagine her marching for the rights of her sisters and brothers of a different color, I could even hear her telling my sister and me her quiet disappointment when she heard others, in public or in her own family, speak of other of God's children in a derogatory way.  I could see in her eyes, in her slow movements, the many pieces, the struggles and the victories that had pieced together to create her life.  It was another gift of quiet magic in that day.

No one can look at that crooked "Father Forgive" sign, site of all of those prayers, and ever be the same.  I won't forget it and I won't forget being fortunate enough to be there with my Mom.  

My Mom left this world soon after that.  We had a delightful dinner, where we talked and laughed and marveled at what we had seen just in that short afternoon.  We knew then that we would never forget that time.  We didn't know everything then, but we knew we were living moments that would be at the forefront of the rest of our being.

My Mom died in a head-on collision on a small, country road in the literary haven that she so loved.  After stopping to get our final mile of directions to the cottage, I apparently re-entered that road on the wrong side of the road (the right side) and the last I remember of our time together was laughing.  I had entered a pub in the middle of Hereford County to ask for directions.  The pub was loud and bustling and the moment I opened my southern-born mouth, the whole place stopped what they were doing and looked my way.  They gave me the simple directions and I went back to the car, all of us laughing about my breaking into that average evening at the country pub.

I am thankful for the sound that I still hear - the sound of my Mom laughing.  I don't know why we had to have the accident.  I don't know why my mother decided not to put on her seatbelt.  I don't know why that was the only time in my adult life that I saw her oversight and didn't ask her to buckle up, though I do remember thinking that the day was just too wonderful.  I didn't want to break in with any reality - didn't want to take even a moment to rain on her parade.  And so I didn't and my Mom was the only person lost in the accident.

I will not claim that it has been easy, because it hasn't been.  I spent years in a guilty haze, a place I know now that I'm a mother myself, that my mother would not have wanted me to be.  I thank God and my amazing family and friends and a few years of life-changing therapy that I came out on the other side.

I would give anything to see my mother again, to watch her looking at my children and laughing with Tim.  I would like to talk to her about my new creative life.  I would like to laugh with her about all of the ways that I just know that Molly is so very like Mary George Dean of Douglas, Ga.  I would love to be witness to Mom and Emma as they worked on a project together, sharing their love of wondering and creating.  I would relish in watching my Mom and Harry laughing and dancing, as he attempted to teach her how to do the latest moves.  And I can actually envision Tim and Mom, lingering around the dinner table, beating each other with smart, sarcastic retorts or in a gentle and quiet conversation about their most intimate beliefs.

Those moments would be wonderful, they would, but they are not part of this life.  That is not to say that Mom is absent here.  She is in my house when someone in my family says something that could only have originated with her or when I study hard to figure out the meaning of a story or when Emma stares off in thought and looks exactly like my Mom and her 'people.'  She is here and I know she laughs with us.  She is still alive in the stories, and she helps me remember why telling them is so vital to our existence.

I plan to keep looking for the stories and I appreciate those of you who come along on the journey.  This week has meant more to me than I could have imagined on Sunday night, just five days ago.  I had no idea what I was attempting, but I am thankful that we've done it.  I've spent the week with Mom, and I thank God for that.

I don't know why things happen the way they do instead of the way they don't - I just know that we are supposed to keep telling the stories and that is what I intend to do.  I plan to tell you about my unbelievable father, too, and I promise I'll do that while he is here to read it.