Susan Lee:: Sharing .Jeremy Dirac I just wanted to share this small eulogy that I wrote for her=3 My mother was little. She was a petite 411,with blonde hair. By the time I was 12 I was already a head taller than her. But my mother was large. She drove a 4-wheel drive SUV, had two St. Bernards the size of miniature ponies, and lived on top of a mountain where she was engaged to a man that can only be described as big. My mother was a terrible cook. She paid almost no attention to the latest news on nutrition. A small pot of mashed potatoes involved both a stick of butter and one of margarine. Her peas were laden with sugar and her Southern style French tomatoes had ample amounts of butter AND sugar. But my mother was a great cook. In fact, Im fairly certain Ive never known a better one. My mother was a serious woman. She felt guilty leaving me alone some mornings to make my own breakfasts as shed sometimes work double shifts as a home health care worker where shed care for those who could no longer care for themselves. But my mother was mischievous. She invented nicknames like Kykleberry and Connor Bonner, for my cousins Kyle and Connor. I can remember a grocery shopping trip where she spent the entire time speaking in a high nasally voice and purposely laughing with a pig snort, much to my embarrassment. My mother was poor. I got the reduced lunch plan at school and she was always scrimping and saving - trying to find the bargains at the grocery store. Although nerdy and not particularly concerned - she insisted that I have new jeans and sneakers at the beginning of every school year. Making sure that I was at least somewhat stylish was far more important to her than buying the things Im sure she wouldve liked to have gotten for herself. But my mother was rich. When we lived in New Jersey, we went to TCBY for frozen yogurt every week- looking forward to trying a new flavor. Though no mansion, she immaculately maintained a cozy little apartment filled with sounds - the meow of a prissy white cat in the kitchen, the dramatic theme song of one of her soapies, like Young and the Restless on the boob tube, the intense whispers of myself, a little boy, imagining epic He-Man action figure battles in the bath tub. My mother was stubborn. When she yelled her voice had the intensity of a thousand suns. It was the kind that could make a soldier or a mountain man respect her if she was angry. But my mother was forgiving. One of the most forgiving people Ive ever known. She once allowed a person down on their luck to stay in her apartment. When an acquaintance of the person came into my mothers apartment and stole all of her grandmothers jewelry, my mother simply forgave her. Ever quick to trust people, my mother was sometimes taken advantage of - but it never stopped her from forgiving and trusting again, and from always being willing to see the good in people. She was the kind of person that would think nothing of giving you the shirt off her back if she saw that you were in need. My mother was fragile. When she passed away, this little womans body was wracked with aches and pains typically reserved for people three decades older. From the slipped disc that she got working long hours lifting large trays of jewelry at one of her jobs, to the osteoporosis that made her bones easily breakable - much like the floral plates that shed inherited from her grandmother, the ones lovingly displayed in her china cabinet. And she had too many feelings. She just couldnt seem to stop feeling. Sometimes she could barely contain it. She regularly felt an anguish that many of us rarely or never do feel. It brings me some relief to say that she was finally coming to grips with some of the pain that she felt at the end of her life and was looking forward to a bright new beginning before she fell asleep for the last time. But while fragile, my mother was strong. She had so so much love to give. When she smiled at a friend in the grocery store, you know she did it with her whole heart. When my mother hugged me it sometimes seemed as if she never wanted to ever let go. She loved with every molecule. It has been the greatest honor of my life to be born the son of Susie - a stubborn, caring, forgiving, and strong woman. My mother was little but she was the biggest person Ive ever known.
Posted on: Wed, 28 May 2014 21:04:31 +0000
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