The Universe wouldn’t leave me alone.  I knew I had to do something about the story in my head to gain some peace.  After all, February 2 was coming up.  If I didn’t take care of this matter, I would have to deal with the issue next year. 

Well, I did!  I am sharing with you, dear readers, my experience in hopes it will be helpful to you if you have a Painful Personal Story in your past.

It all began last month when I caught myself thinking I would send an email to two special friends. Then, it struck.  They both died in 2020!  I remember a few last conversations with each of them.  Both of these women, in their eighties, talked about their mothers and things that happened long ago. 

Crap! I said to myself.  The anniversary of my mother’s death, February 2, 1964, was coming up.  Once again, I knew the day wouldn’t be easy.  Funny, the anniversary of the passing of my dad and two aunts I was close to never affect me.  Those days just goes by.

However, the Universe decided this was the year to look at why her death bothered me so.

The first message from the Universe I received was from a friend who told me she had redone a scrapbook of her memories from her teaching career.  She said she had a few bad experiences with some of the kids.  Overtime, she had looked at those incidents and decided as she put it, “To modify the narrative presented in her scrapbook.” 

Then – the audacity of the Universe – I read in “Meditations on the Mat,” my yoga book I read before practice each morning this phrase from a song by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: 

“It don’t make no difference to me, you believe what you want to

Believe, but you don’t have to live like a refugee.”

Authors Rolf Gates and Katrina Kenison summed up in this phrase from the song: “The solution, of course, is a shift in perception. She can make a conscious choice to perceive something anew, to believe something else about herself.”

Finally, I suddenly remembered a conversation the Queen had with the King in Lewis Carroll’s “Through the Looking Glass”: “The horror of that moment, the King said, “I shall never, never forget.  “You will, though, said the Queen, “if you don’t make a memorandum of it.”

I need to tell you, dear reader, that my mom and I got off to a very bad start.  I had a breach forceps birth at Denver’s St. Joseph Hospital, shortly after the end of World War II.  My mother almost died. I almost died.  She was given the Last Rites by the Catholic Church and I was quickly baptized and given the equivalent of the Last Rites for newborns.  It is a wonder I don’t have congenital cerebral palsy. Needless to say, my mom and I never had that important bonding experience.

(As a side note: Dr. Justina Ford, a Black woman, who lived within walking distance of St. Joseph’s, was known for her ability to “turn babies.” She assisted in over 7,000 births. Maybe, she could have made a difference in the lives of my mother and me.  I learned in my research for “Murder and a Victory Garden” neither Black or Jewish doctors were allowed to practice in Denver until the 1950s when General Rose Hospital (now Rose Medical Center). Dr. Ford is honored each year on her birthday, January 22.)

With February second fast approaching, I decided to have a date with my mother. We would “relive,” if you will, three upsetting episodes in my life as a young child, age three and four, and have dinner together.

The first thing “we did together” was to color in my coloring book.  I was upset because I could not “stay in the lines” like Debbie, a 6-year-old girl I had been with the night before when my parents were visiting her folks.  As I colored my Mom Explained to me that Debbie was older and had colored far longer than I had.  She was sure I would get as good as Debbie in the future.  Mom liked what I was coloring. Since Scotch tape and refrigerator magnets weren’t around in 1950, we could not hang my art on the fridge. But, she helped me rip out the sheet, and we proudly put it on the dining room table.

A short time later, Mom and I skipped to Safeway to buy our neighbor Mrs. Byrd and us flowers. She was our next door neighbor and was most upset with me because I had picked some of her grape hyacinths for a bouquet for my mom.  I had no idea why this older woman screamed at me; after all, she was always nice when we visited her at her candy shop on South Broadway.  Mom explained the flowers were special to her, and Mrs. Byrd was delighted when they bloomed.  Mom suggested next time I thought about picking her flowers, I ask her first.  (Actually, we drove in my silver CRV Honda.)

When we got back home, it was time for me to go get my Covid vaccine at a supermarket pharmacy about 60 miles away.  At first, I was upset this was the only time and place I could get the coveted shot because I wanted to spend the afternoon making cookies with Mom, which we had never done in the past.  Then, I remembered when I was four and our family had a big “Quarantine” sign on our front door.  I had scarlet fever. Our doctor made a house call and gave me with a long needle a big shot of penicillin, the new miracle drug. My mom was none too happy that the doc also gave my infant sister a big shot, too. After I was checked into the pharmacy, my mom and I went into a small room where she stood by scared me (as a little girl)  as a kind woman gave the inoculation.  We then got a goody and went home.  (Note: the vaccine did not hurt at all.) 

After we returned home, I used my Grubhub app to order Mom and me sumptuous artichoke soup and an arugula salad from an Italian restaurant I knew my mom would love.  As “we” sat at my kitchen table, I construed what daily life had been like for my mom, a 1950s housewife, former executive secretary, wife of a man rapidly climbing the corporate ladder, mom of two daughters and a woman with severe heart damage caused by rheumatic fever as a teenager. I thought of the many gifts she had given me including, excellent nutrition ( lots and lots of vegetables, but no fried food or soda pop for her family!) an interest and flare for fashion, writing (I always wondered why she didn’t write when she was my mom.  Her life then was consumed with lots of household and marital duties and her ever weakening heart required more and more drugs and hospital stays) and most importantly sunsets – yes, my mother gave me sunsets!  She and I had few intimate moments. But, many times I would catch her standing at our big picture window in the living room that had a magnificent view of Long’s Peak.  She would say to me, “Come watch the sunset with me.  My old boss, Mr. Jonas, often asked me to watch it with him.  My mother and I would spend several minutes in awe of this spectacular site.  

I looked out my kitchen window. There was a magnificent crimson display of the sun setting.   

RIP – Mom.

Dear readers – I don’t know how this exercise works.  I do know make-believe got me through many dark and murky moments as a child.  Visualization has helped me immensely play many sports. As a public relations professional of many years, I was paid well as a “spin doctor.”  All I know is that today I feel a deep peace when I think of my mother Rose.

Copyright – Elizabeth J. Wheeler, February 10, 2021