Harriet

As Thanksgiving approaches, and I think about all the things I am thankful for, I find myself thinking increasingly of my mother, Harriet.

Lately, when I look at my hands as I am crocheting or cooking, I see Harriet's hands.  There are times when I am passing my reflection, and I see Harriet there in my features.

I've shared before how blessed I am to have had the parents that I had, and the family that I have.  As with many daughters, the relationship with my mom was way more complicated than the relationship with my dad.

Harriet had a stroke in December 2010, and never really recovered.  She suffers from brain damage from the stroke, ordinary dementia, and Alzheimer's type dementia.  

It is really hard to have someone you love be physically present, and mentally absent.   At first, Harriet knew us, and could talk about the family, and share memories and talk about things, but that presence has faded over time.

It seems the more that you can't reminisce with someone you love, the more you remember on your own.

Harriet was a dreamer of dreams.  She was always waiting for her big win in Atlantic City, or the big lottery win.   She imagined all sorts of amazing lives for her kids and grandkids, nieces, nephews, and great-nieces and great-nephews.

Every good report card spiraled into discovering a cure for cancer, or facilitating world peace.  It never occurred to her that we would all just be ordinary people, in a world full of ordinary people.

Harriet was a great believer in that one thing.  If this one thing or that one thing would happen, everything would be perfect.

She loved my dad wholeheartedly.  So much, in fact, that she never really learned how to live again after he died.  Harriet could get up for an occasion, but she was sad, probably clinically depressed from January 14, 2000, the day Daddy died.

Harriet tried harder than anyone else I can think of to make everyone she met feel welcome and appreciated.  She had to have too many desserts for holidays, because everyone had to have their favorite every time.

She was a child of The Great Depression, and had a food hoarding problem.  She graduated high school in 1945, and was on the yearbook committee.   She and the other girls on the committee drew a black frame around the pictures of the boys in the yearbook that were killed in action in World War II before the yearbooks were distributed.

But she never told me how those girls felt drawing those frames.  I never got to see inside.

Harriet's legacy will be one of enduring love.  Her love for her family, her love for all of God's Children.

As her mind broke, and she started to disappear, it became apparent that old pain and suffering were still very present in her mind.  There was nothing anyone could do to comfort her.

I wish that Harriet would have shared more of what was in her head with me.  More of her innermost thoughts and fears and triumphs.   Maybe then, I could have found the right words when she was suffering.

It seems that we never progressed past the stage where the parent shields the child from the scary inside of the mind.  As much as Harriet loved me, she stayed mother to my daughter, with the requisite barriers for my protection.  We never had the chance to progress to two women who happened to be related who were also great friends.

So, as I think about Harriet, my plea to all of you is to share yourself with those you love and who love you.  Peel back the layers, let all of your brokenness and all of your amazingness shine for your people.

The more fully engaged in our relationships we are, the more there is to comfort ourselves with when those we love can no longer be engaged.

It is hard to break out of the role patterns that define our familial relationships.  But I believe that the richness of a full relationship depends on the filters being removed.  

Be brave in your relationships with those you love.   You, and those you love, will be richer for it.