My mother passed in February 2024. This Monday, October 5th would’ve marked her 100th birthday. Oh how I wish we could be celebrating that milestone and not just in spirit. My dad passed 11 months prior to her’s and I’m always grateful that she didn’t have to be a widow for too long. He was 96, my mom 98. We used to jokingly call her a Cougar.
I think what I miss most about my mother was her quirky sense of humor and how I could so easily make her laugh. And she was funny, often without even meaning to be. If we took a photo with her in it, she demanded to see it. If she approved she’d say, “Make it go viral,” without really knowing what that meant. If she didn’t like it she’d threaten us if she found out we’d posted it on Social Media. I can’t even remember what the consequences were, but we didn’t want to chance it so we deleted what she didn’t approve.
She also absolutely forbade anyone to reveal her age which was unusual because she looked so incredibly younger than she was. In the last times of her life spent with me when she was 95-98, people would look at me in disbelief in places like doctor’s offices where birthdates were required. On those occasions when we went to the hospital, I’d find nurses gathering over her to admire the quality of her skin. Once, while on a gurney, she managed to nearly squeeze off my hand when a nurse mentioned her age. Ouch!
As practical as she was, my mother was always a great supporter of my artistic endeavors. She watched me put up a good corporate front with my fancy job in New York City for a few years, and when I left that position, allowed me to use the finished basement of my family home as my art studio until I got one of my own. When I told her I was going to purchase a new portable display I wanted for exhibiting my work at art shows, she gave me money to order the one I needed.
My mom had a talent for writing, and I like to think I inherited that ability from her. She encouraged me. When I mentioned her I wanted to pursue my writing and become an author, she paid for a children’s literature course. When I got a gig at a local book store for my first book signing at the Jersey Shore, she and my dad attended.
And then there were the multitude of pets that graced our home, My Menagerie on the Hill. When I was ten, my parents gifted me my first dog, a purepred cocoa brown toy poodle. Somewhere there are photos of me cuddling my new puppy on a snowy lawn in New Jersey with my mom standing next to us.
My mom was the kind of person that if she liked someone they could do no wrong. If she didn’t, however, she did not mince words and often had a colorful label, or nickname, for them. She and Rich got along for the most part. Rich couldn’t be intimidated by her and they had a lot of fun. They both loved to cook and learned from each other. Their last days together were spent in Georgia and sometimes that wasn’t easy. By then her Congestive Heart Failure was advancing and because she didn’t want to take her water reducing meds, she ended up in the hospital for ten days. Caring for my elderly parents in the immediate wake of my husband’s death was helpful in many ways, yet emotionally exhausting.
When my father passed in Georgia in April 2023, she called me a few days later and told me we needed to talk. I could guess what that was about. I brought a friend for support and when we arrived she declared, “I’m not going to die in this state.” Of course we had to laugh and later I sang a line from a popular song out at that time by Kane Brown that declared the singer wanted to be buried in Georgia. I added the word “don’t” to the lyrics.
And of course, because she did still have a sense of humor, she thought that was funny. I promised her I’d make yet another arrangement with another facility this time in New York State. I made arrangements for her final flight which too had its comical highlights.
I just edited a chapter in my memoir that recounts some of these moments. I feel her each day encouraging me to write on and I will. That’s what the book is about. She never got to see my log home, not in earthly form anyway.
Happy 100 years young and still inspiring Mom. I hope you don’t mind me revealing your age. You are loved and missed by many. Thanks for all you did for me, and others.
