Mother's Day

It was a fit full Spring morning. The season was at the peak of its adolescence, confused, not knowing whether to laugh or cry, a rain shower here a ray of sunlight there. I rode my bike down the hill to the beach stopping by the coffee shop Mom used to take me to. The barista and I had the same cold calculated conversation that is so common in American transactions. I poured my coffee and turned to walk out into the courtyard, where I could see the rhododendrons in full bloom. Pablo Neruda ran through my head, "I want to do to you what Spring does to the cherry blossom."

Three old men sat around a table near the door, all were nicely dressed with white hair and sunken features, two were discussing something, probably the weather. The third silently stared into space. His eyes had a far off quality to them as if he could remember the songs his mother sang him when he was boy, but not what he had eaten for breakfast that morning. I opened the door to walk outside and he looked up at me, head tilted to the side. Our eyes met for a second and I couldn't help but think he was feeling the same way I was. No mother to go home to, it was just another day to live out as well as we could.

I read on a bench for awhile, but the noise coming from the street kept me distracted. Feeling crazy from caffeine I rode until I reached the last true forest in the area. On the trail I encountered some guy ripping out foliage and making some completely useless new trail. He said hello to me and I just gave him the most offended look I could muster. I should have told him what I thought about what he was doing, but I didn't feel up for a confrontation in the middle of the woods. I continued on until I reached the Yew tree I've been visiting since coming home. There is nothing too spectacular about it, except that it is the only one in the forest. The things that are the rarest have always attracted me the most. I picked up a fallen branch, sat down, and began to whittle a face into it. The blade slipped and I cut open my finger open. I let the blood soak into the wood, imagining that it would give it magical powers.

Really I was just putting off going home. Home to the house that Mom said she would never move out of. Before settling in Mukilteo, her and Dad moved six times in as many years while raising Johanna and me. We called a number of motels home along the way and although I have only fleeting memories of that time, I knew Mom had made up her mind to stay in Mukilteo.

Today there aren't even any pictures of her hanging in the house and her ashes have been hidden away somewhere. This time of year always makes me think of her, not just because of Mother's Day, its something about Spring and the rebirth of nature. Maybe its because she died when I was thirteen, in the Spring of my life. Maybe its because her birthday is in May. I really don't know, its a combination of things. I've lived almost as long without her as I did with her. She was diagnosed with cancer when I was five and I have very few memories from before that. I remember the hospitals and lying with her in hospital beds. I remember the yelling, the panic, the anxiety, the fear. I remember the traumatic times so much more clearly than the happy times. Its as if I'm scared to remember the good things. Maybe I've repressed them because of how much it hurts to remember her love. I never want to forget her. I miss her so much.

I hope that someday when I'm an old man I can sit in coffee shops and look back on it all with a lucid memory. Until then I'll do my best. I love you Mom, Happy Mother's Day.