A Mother’s Day Letter to My Late Mom

As everyone is brunching, spa-ing, shopping, and laughing with their mothers, I’m comfortably in bed, remembering you and how safe the world was when you were next to me.

I would give anything for five minutes just to ask you how you’ve been. I want to tell you about all you’ve missed, while you’ve been on the greatest vacation of all time. Did you see me? Did you see my heartbreak, did you see when I spoke fiercely the same way you did, did you see the party I threw for dad?

Mother’s Day became so bittersweet when you left us. My heart breaks when I wish so terribly that you were here. I wish with every ounce of my being that we became the mother and daughter, doubled in age, sitting on the park bench together. I wish that life had allowed us to have more time together than my troubled teenage years. I wish that when I become a mother, you would be my late night call pleading, “mom, I can’t get him to stop crying!” I wish that you were going to be next to me on my wedding day. I wish I could drive to your house in the morning for coffee, the same way you did with your mom. I wish I didn’t have moments of feeling like I was robbed of my time with you.

You gave me some of the best of your days. You gave me your Christmas-morning smile (where you turned into a kid again). You gave me your old-soul advice that I will carry with me throughout my life. You gave me your loopy wine-drunk (rarely, but hilariously). You gave me your vulnerability, and you gave me your fierceness. You gave me my whole world, literally and metaphorically, and you gave me – you created – the woman I am today…the woman moulded, taught, and loved by you.

Happy Mother’s Day to my ma, who taught me all about life, even through her death. On a day that’s meant to be full of gifts and celebrations for you, I feel as though I have received the ultimate gift – being your daughter.

I love you THIS much – to the moon,