Stuck Inside a Cloud

[Merry]

Hello all you lovely, understanding and caring people. I'm listening to George Harrison's last cd called "Brainwashed." He wrote it as he was dying from his own battle with cancer. Stuck Inside a Cloud is one of the songs and it's so lovely.

Anyway, the point is....my beautiful, scrappy Mom lost her battle with cancer on June 13. She did it her way, she didn't linger in pain while cancer ate away her insides, she said that was her biggest fear.

We went to my cousin's for a casual dinner party in honor of her daughter graduating and her husband's 55th Birthdayj on the 11th. I bought her a pretty new blouse that she insisted I take back because it was too expensive, and by HER resale shop standards, maybe it was but it was covered in pastel butterflies and looked so nice on her that I told her to shut up and wear it!

I fixed her hair the way she liked it best, packed up the oxy tank and we boogied. The "kids" waited on her like she was a Queen, or maybe just the Elder Matriarch of our family, and she was basking in the attention and loving every minute of it. She got to see her favorite great nephew Graham, (who I think reminded her of her own little bro when they were young) and they had a nice talk, and compared their blonde curls. ( I gave Mom her first perm lol) We were sitting around the dining room table and telling family stories, and I teased Mom about all the "senior abuse" I was subjecting her to and was GONNA subject her to like putting a helium tank on her instead of oxygen, or nitrous oxide...ha she said with a grin!

She was certainly the Belle of the Ball, the Grande Dame and it felt like Thanksgiving and Christmas and all the Birthday Parties in a life rolled into one magical night as everyone poured their love on her and she basked and took it all in and it seemed to wipe years away til she looked young, strong and vibrant and full of sass.
She never even had to use her oxygen, which by now she had been on 24/7. This WAS a magical night, and it was a gift from God, to have her so strong and beautiful.
We had a delightful ride home just talking about the night and other good times. We got home and she put on her pjs and settled in on the couch with the TV and I was making her and her dog some peanut butter toast for a midnight snack. She "accidently" found some soft porn and excitedly called me in to see "what this woman was doing to this man" but all you could see was her hair covering up the "good parts," lolol. I thought she had fallen or the oxy machine quit on her, but it was just silly Mom, wanting to show her daugther something wild...and it made me laugh when she said she was going to just watch it long enough to see the "perky boobs" and I told her that I was glad she was enjoying her porn but that I could NOT watch it with her!
Sunday she was quiet but not unusually so, and I fixed her a bit of breakfast and tea. We knew she was gonna have to get her lungs tapped sooner than scheduled, so she had to take things slower than usual.
She collasped in the kitchen late afternoon, and was rushed to the hospital.
When I got there with clothes for her because I figured she'd rally and need clean stuff to wear home....she wasn't really there anymore. She was unconscious and wouldn't ever wake up again....they said something about a massive heart attack or a stroke.

We got her into a private room, and I set up my laptop next to her bed with some Native American flute music playing because it's so spiritual, calming, mystical, and she loved it so much.

Finally, Monday morning, while I watched her breathing get easier since our doc put her on a morphine drip, I was rubbing her feet and telling my pretty Mama that it was OK to go the that Far Country and that I would be ok...I'd miss her awfully bad but it was OK...just go and be with her dear sister Micki, who was waiting for her just across that Rainbow Bridge....and she stopped breathing. My Mama was no more....
And so I'm stuck inside a cloud today, but it's not a rain cloud...it's bright white, surrounded by an ocean of blue sky, and if I look hard a little to the left, I can see her smiling that smile and waving at me telling me it's alllll ok and to get that car packed UP and get the HELL outta Dodge and back to my husband, the other boxer, and the desert hills I love so much.

So, as I sit on the deck, surrounded by the pots of flowers we planted together, looking at the hummers dancing and sparring at the feeder, feeling the Summer sun warm my broken heart, I know she's just to the left of me....sending me her Mother's Love...and winking at me while I read those letters an old flame wrote to her many years ago....oh my!

I've found in all of this that there is no love like a Mother's Love. Dad, bro, sis, wife or husband will love you, but NEVER love you with the strength that a Mother loves her children with. That's where the pain is, not having my Mom here to tell me it's ok and to kiss the "owie" and make it all better again.

Thanks for letting me run on and on and I hope your eyes aren't burned out from all my wordiness.

Mom didn't want a funeral service, no obit notice, and her ashes are on the end table by the couch where she once sat and watched TV. I bought 2 small urns for my brother and myself, and I'll fill them before my uncles, her last 2 brothers and I take her ashes to the cemetery and bury them with her husband and the little baby she lost long ago.

Farewell Mamacita, you taught me how to garden, to love the earth, the animals, the stars, and mostly to laugh. love and to live.
Save me a hug...and I'll see ya when I get there...