Memories for Mom

Mother's Day. I think back to those days around my mother's passing and all that whirlwind of what felt like a tornado (at least in my head). I also find myself recalling the moments of clarity and the things that I had said to various family and friends. One conversation that comes to mind today relates to the question posed to myself: What do you miss the most about her? To look at this question on the screen of my computer... I wonder how one could answer that question in the context of the time in which all of that chaos was occurring. I remember my answer... ' I miss her for the future as much as a I miss her now'. All the changes that life puts to each of us and that in the progression of time we change our perspective on the world and upon ourselves too. I often wonder how my life would have been different had she recovered and lived on. Do I wish her back? Yes and no. I miss her for all times and changes in my life that have occurred over the past nine years. I do not in order to save her from he suffrage of her final few years. I've had some lowdown moments and some very heartfelt moments. I do miss her for the future. She saw me out of the nest per say but, not to far out of it. I know that if she were still here, she would indeed be quite proud of her son. This I do know.

From the middle east to the west side to inside of me

Well, how's that for travel? If only it had happened. It is my 'travels' from finishing up 'The Arabian Nights' to gearing up to start on the summer musical, 'West Side Story'. Our first production meeting will be on saturday, May 10th at the theatre. I'm looking forward to working on what shall be the largest cast/production to be staged on SBCT's mainstage. I'm already mentally preparing myself to start casting my search for a full stage crew including at least two onstage managers and at least a runner/stage crew person assigned to each of us. I want this to be 'the shit' in terms of a crew and how we operate behind the scenes to make the performers shine out there onstage. Auditions will take place on May 19th & 2oth (possibly the 21st). Rehearsals will probably begin the first of June once all the students are out of school and home for the summer. I've become aware that there will be a great turnout for the auditions just based on the limited buzz about the show that I have been hearing. That is my life in the world today.
Tomorrow will be what would have been my mother's sixty-second birthday, May 5th, 1946. This year marks the ninth anniversary of her passing, April 29th, 1999. This year seems to have had less of an obvious effect upon me. I think about her constantly. Perhaps, that it why I'm not as affected by these days as I have been in the past. Yes, they are very relavant to me and I still get worked up about it when I really focus my thoughts on the morning she passed on as I stood at her bedside as she struggled for the hour and ten minutes that she did so before dying. Those images in my mind only reinforce my views to keep doing everything that I can to live a full and content life...one day, will come and I will be gone as well. I pay homage to her in doing and being the person that I hope she had hoped me to be. I smile. I am. This I know in my heart to be so. I still miss her for the future... all the things that she has not or will not ever see. 'Everything Works Out' is still true as it was back then. That is one change that is constant as well. 'I love you too, Mom'.