Mother’s Day – a time for memories

I love Mother’s day, it is a time to spoil and pamper my lovely mother, and now, with a beautiful boy of my own, I get spoiled too. In fact, he presented me with a lovely bear he had chosen last week, he was just too excited to wait. (He also told me that he had actually wanted to get me a big fat duck, but his dad had (thankfully) said no. Cue me giggling like a fool for ages afterwards.) But even though Mother’s day is a day of joy and happiness, there is a sadness to the day too, for someone is missing from the celebrations.

My mother-in-law Rita passed away from lung cancer in April 2009, and the very early age of 55. Joe was just 4 months old, and we felt bereft and cheated that she would never have the chance to know and love her grandson, and he would never get the opportunity to get to know a nanny who had loved him from the minute she had set her eyes on him. Rita was a real force of nature, full of life and laughter, a women who loved wine and fashion, real life crime novels and fine food. She cherished her children and grandchildren, was fiercely intelligent, and loved nothing more than sunning herself in the Spanish sunshine with a martini and a swimming pool close by. She was gone too soon, and for my husband, Joe and I, there is a gap left by her passing that never disappears. I don’t mind admitting I miss her every single day.

For a time we thought about consulting a medium to try to say goodbye properly. Despite her illness, her passing had been sudden, and we never got chance to say a proper goodbye. It also seemed that maybe she was trying to talk to us, at times I could smell the distinctive perfume she wore, and some family photographs flashed up on a computer, even though I could not find them in any file. (I know I searched and searched.) Pete my husband also felt his mom’s presence at times when he was feeling really low in his grief. Ultimately, we decided against it, we have our memories and photographs which help to keep a person in your hearts and mind, and I love to tell Joe about his other nanny, who he calls his nanny up in heaven.

So this mother’s day will be full of love and joy, we will go for a lovely family meal and make new memories, and will also be attending a special birthday party for a little girl turning one. But we will also be remembering another mom who, although no longer with us, is never really far away.

*For Rita, Peter, Lina, Den, Lia and Joe.xxx

*post in collaboration with TheCircle

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