Mothers' Day

This is my first Mothers' Day without Susan. We are coming up on six months, but this is the first significant "day of celebration" without her.  My sense is that this is a biggie because she was so involved in being a mom. She loved her kids and her kids' sweeties with immense passion and regard. And because of her huge commitment to motherhood, I learned to be a pretty good stepfather, an honor I would not trade for any other thing of value in my life to date.

I am also thinking of my own mother, widowed at the age of 36, and how horrific it must have been for her at a time when little was known about grief and how it works.  She was expected, as were we all (I was told time and again at the age of 10 that 'now I had to be the man of the family') to just pick up and move on. Infinitely easier said than done.

So to Susan, my beautiful princess, mother extraordinaire:Happy Mothers' Day.

And to my own mom, who did the very best she could under awful circumstances:my undying gratitude to you for giving me those things you did. An appreciation of beauty, of art and literature and science; a skeptic's curiosity.  Happy Mothers' Day to you as well.

I will be blogging here from time to time about grief and related issues.  Thanks for reading!