I thought

 

It would get better...easier somehow. It hasn't.

The gnawing feeling of something missing has instead gone deeper and become so much more complex.

Today would have been my mother's 89th birthday. She left us just under two years ago.

I still miss her.

Alice the Wonder Woman.

I miss Dad too, but daughters, and sons too, seem to have a special connection with their mamas. As I get older and life becomes ever more challenging, I miss her amazing wisdom more and more. Things happen and my mind wants to run them by her, hear her thoughts, learn from her knowledge and understanding of life. We talked almost every day for the vast majority of my entire life. 68 years worth. The conversations in my head are not the same, nor is singing to her picture on the kitchen wall. (We shared the tragic inability to sing on key, along with the sheer joy of doing it anyhow.)

All I can do these days is my own personal best but I am not a lot like her. She was bold and strong and sassy, but joyful with it. She was always delighted with life and babies and fun, and so darned loving to us all, especially Dad, but all of us. I am quieter, more introverted, a worrier to the point of inertia. Not only did she get things done, she got me to get things done too.

Life is shallower without her, duller, less rounded and well-formed. I thought it would get better.

But it didn't. I miss you, Mama.