Saturday Touch Past...

That's what today was as I decided to clear out my back bedroom where everything gets tossed. I should say 'start' to clear it out. I didn't get as far as I wanted because I touched the past--alot. I found letters from a guy I went to high school with. Turns out we exchanged handwritten letters during one of his years in college. I didn't/don't even remember! Cards signed by my sweet Daddy. I can't believe on 10/18 will be the tenth anniversary of his passing. Found pictures of Dad before diabetes really made its move. Healthy, robust and King Edward cigar in his mouth. There was also a letter I 'wrote' to my Dad wishing him Happy Father's Day. I looked at the envelope. It was dated a year after I was born. Ha! I'm sure Mom helped! I've mentioned I was such an Osmond Brothers fan back in the day---well, I found negatives, probably all my negatives, of that mystical, magical time. Such a surprise! The big question, do places still reprint off 110 negatives? The actual prints, I have lost some thru the years--so for an Osmond fan, this is quite the jackpot! More photos, newspaper clippings, notes I'd received from management at the company I worked at before my current one. I'd given the CEO a copy of my then newly self published book. He sent me a nice note back which include his wish for my writing career to thrive! Completely forgot that! Cards to celebrate my birthday, good wishes when I left a company. sympathy for my dad's passing and get wells after my pesky open heart surgery. All these things span my whole life. Then I found a sympathy card from the girl who was my BFF thru our girlhood growing up years. I remember I was surprised I heard nothing from her when Dad passed. She had family in our hometown and Dad's passing was mentioned about every hour on our local small town radio station mixed in with the soy bean report. The BFF lived in another state, yet I thought her family would tell her. My house was her home away from home, when we grew up. We were that close. One inhaled, while the other exhaled. When I got back to Dallas, after Dad's funeral, and still not a word from her, I wrote BFF to tell her of my Dad's passing. Her handwritten letter told me her family didn't tell her. And we hadn't been the closest thing in those recent times. She apologized several times in the letter saying there was no other place she would have been if she'd known. Also the former BFF said it had been awhile since we'd spoken and left me her phone number. Maybe we should try to talk again. I didn't remember that part of her 2001 letter. I sat, in the midst of my clutter in 2011 and wondered if I ever called her. I thought we were so estranged by 2001, why bother? Or I did call her and the conversation wasn't one for the scrapbooks?

When you touch the past like that. does it have room in your today?

Hmm.

October 23, 2001 was Tuesday

...and I remember it well. It was my dad's funeral and I wanted to smack the preacher. He was chosen by my step-mother, because well, frankly I didn't know any. Until my uncle mentioned another man who precided over my mom's funeral years before and actually grew up with my dad. This other man did speak at the end of my dad's funeral and was great.

OK, back to the first preacher. He kept pronouncing our last name wrong. And when I was up at the podium to deliver my dad's eulogy, I began to tear up. Well, he started preaching and saying our name wrong. I looked back at him, and told him so. People that knew me were about to laugh, and my step mother said my name, because they knew I was about ready to do Smack Down in the chapel--OK--and this was before I started my Spiritual Walk...

Later on that evening, a friend of my dad's stopped by the house. He said he'd arrived late to the funeral, but got there in enough time for me to wanna beat up the preacher.....yea, OK..well, maybe...

On this day, in 2010, I still basked in the Texas Rangers win to go into the World Series, then off to a bible study, and then my writers' group, while on my way home the rain poured, thunder rumbled and lightening cracked the sky. I was invited to a Halloween Party tonight--yet just feelin' all into it.

I also watched the Iowa Hawkeyes

lose to the Wisconsin Badgers I didn't like the losing part, yet I liked watching the Hawks play. Because on this 9th anniversary of my dad's death, I knew he watched it with me.

Just like always.

September 24, 1971 was Friday

Just like today.

I recall that sunny 1971 day very well.

I was in 8th grade-the highest grade in our junior high-

Rough and tough, our class yelled the loudest

Our first pep rally for our junior high football guys--

We were in 8th grade and next year HIGH SCHOOL!

Couldn't wait to race home and tell my folks-

My mom tried to listen, so did my dad.

Mom lie in bed. Dad sat in a chair next to the bed.

I knew Mom hadn't felt well, I just didn't know how bad-

Until one of Mom's friends came to the house with her

Daughter who was my age, and shortly thereafter

An ambulance arrived.

As my Mom was strapped to a gurney to leave our home,

She pet our Siamese cat, Minglee, who I held

Hostage in my arms. and I leaned over to kiss her--

"Mama love" she said--like she did every night.

Then Mom told me I was to be the woman of the house

When she wasn't there.

I bit my lip. Didn't want Mom to see me cry.

That was the last time I saw my mother alive.

Three days later Mom was dead.

I was 13.

And I cried.

My Mom

Like Before

Horses, a dog, corn fields and my orange car. Iowa. Screams IOWA, huh? You may need to click on it, to biggify it. Well, maybe all except the orange car aka my Pumpkin. This was snapped at a chum's house. They have 5 acres of mowable yard, the rest somebody farms on. They live on a gravel road. I'd forgotten how tricky gravel can be--if you go a bit too fast--trust me.

Iowa. This is the first visit, since my dad's passing in 2001, that the visit home felt different. It felt good. See, even tho Iowa was my home, I had no home to go to. My dad wasn't there to great me with his infamous King Edward cigar in his mouth. Would be an emotional roller coaster, the few times I did go back to Iowa. A classmate, who lives in Iowa, still says it's sometimes hard for her to come to our hometown, because her parents are gone too. I thought I was alone--yet more and more adult children, more so those who have moved away, experience this. I still have friends and other family---however it just wasn't the same.

This trip tho--I didn't feel all the emotion. Sure, I cried when I headed out to the cemetery to see my parents' graves. I told them I still wanted to make them so proud. Outside of that--I felt closure. All was OK.

In fact, I had the BEST time in Iowa, I'd had in a long, long time. I was asked if I would ever move back. I don't know. Being there, did feel right. Maybe because all the classmates, back for the reunion, knew me 'before'. Knew me from the first. And I liked that.

Lots to ponder as I drove south on I-35 and smiled when I finally saw this sign:

Would I move back? No clue.

I do know, I have lunch tomorrow with a classmate who's lived in Dallas, maybe just a bit longer than I have. We hadn't seen each other in a few years until this past weekend. Sadly he's now a widower. Our Saturday night chat was filled with sweetness, fun, and laughs.

Just like I remember.

Just like before.