She doted on me.
She gave me her resemblance.
She made me peanut and jelly sandwiches for lunch.
She took me to soccer practice and went to all my soccer games.
She cooked separate dinners for me, because I was finicky eater.
She let me hide in the center of the circular clothing racks when she was shopping. She has been there for me for as long as I can remember.
~~~
On a recent family visit to see her, with most of my brothers and nephews also in town. Saturday morning sitting in the back seat. Listening to her, sitting in the front passenger seat, hum along to the oldies radio station, playing a constant loop of the popular songs of the 50’s and 60’s.
The bizarre and unfortunate scenes were still fresh from the events that unfolded the night before, and a memory came to mind.
It was a pleasant early autumn afternoon. Looking out my window to a cloudless blue sky blanketing over the warm green lawn. Tropical flower accents of reds and yellows. My mother pauses on the concrete walk
from the driveway to the front door.
She is cursing and stomping. At first, I could not see why, but then I saw them. A number of big, colorful grasshoppers, as colorful as the afternoon.
She is cursing and stomping and crushing, between shoe and concrete, as many of the Eastern Lubbers as she can.
~~~
After breakfast on Sunday morning, all are preparing to leave. She noticed her grandson awkwardly holding a number of items in his arms.
“He needs something to put all of that stuff in,” she goes off to the pantry for a longer than normal time.
Returning later, holding a bag in her hand and looking at me blankly, “I am not sure what this is for.”
