sisters

Unexpected Moments

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I had a visit with my aunts yesterday. My mind is flooded with memories. I don’t have clear 8mm movie memories. I have Polariod memories. Fuzzy snapshots of moments in time.  I am sitting in the back yard of the house I grew up in.  It was a field of corn plowed by my Daddy once upon a time.

I asked again about the table. My grandmother, Arie Eola Brown Hamm, had my grandfather, Charley Richard Hamm, build her a table large enough so that even me and John Bullet could sit with the family for dinner.

She loved for everyone to dress up for Christmas dinner. I have a photo of my gorgeous father in a suit and tie for one Christmas.  How beautiful life was then.

My mother recounted a note that Granny Arie was disappointed when Mother gave Daddy work clothes for Christmas instead of dress clothes.  Perhaps that is the complete synopsis of my completely ambiguous mind.

My beloved LuLu and I are planning on a 20/20 Vision for 2020.

I know what dreams Rock and I are having. We have a vision for the future. We are ready to step out into a new life together. He will understand when he reads this.  My focus and understanding of a particular part of my “style” has become clear only after our new dream appeared. And that new dream only appeared when I surrendered.  To Him, to Rock, and to the Future. And also surrendered the past.

Mama isn’t ever coming home.  I can stop waiting for her to return.

**wrote the above a while back. Don’t know why I didn’t post it.

But, today, I cried. After all this time, LuLu and I got around to a conversation that revealed she knew my Mama from working at the hospital.  This conversation came about in a winding way as conversations do between two women who love each other like we do. She is my sister. In spirit rather than flesh. May I say amid all the current conflict that our skin tones are different and we have never cared one whit about the difference. But, I cried today just discovering that my sister knew my Mother. So, Mama does still come home sometimes.

The Women

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Once again the women gathered. This past weekend my mother’s two sisters, their best friend, and several more of us gathered for dinner and laughs. There were four generations represented. The oldest in their mid-seventies and the youngest at eighteen months.

We ate dessert first. Then after dinner and a lot of talking and laughing, we donned Mardi Gras beads and crazy hats for our group photo. My aunt figures out something silly for us to put on each time for the pictures.

The littlest two girls loved the beads. They loaded all they could around their necks. Our baby girl finally dropped hers down to her ankles and kicked them off!   Big sister’s pile must have weighed half as much as she did!

This is a new ritual for us. My mother’s youngest sister has been diagnoses with Alzheimer’s. One would have to pay attention to realize she is having problems. When we are all together, she laughs and visits right along with us. We will try to get as many laughs and hugs in as we can in the time each of us has left.

What else is there? Love. In the end, that is all that matters. In the end, it is what made us and what sustains us. He is Love. From His Love He created us. Through His Love He saves us. To His Love we will return.

To love and worship Him through Christ. To keep His commandments. To keep His command to love each other. When one really gets to the center of that concept, everything else is a natural outpouring of true love. It is hard to love others. To make our way to true love. It is risky and dangerous to extend the heart and mind to love. To love and be loved.

And so, Lord willing, the women will continue to gather. To love and be loved. To learn to love even more. To teach the little ones how to love and be loved. Just as our mother’s before us taught us to love. In their memory and honor we gather to sustain each other and grow another generation to love and sustain each other.

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