~Break~

I have to stop looking at quotes.  Good grief, you wouldn’t think it would be so difficult to Google a few interesting and profound quotes for my presentations, but HOLY HELL, the sugary sweet, two hearts-one soul, perfect love, LOVE is the answer to all life’s questions….   ugh.  I have to stop.

My mother came over today.  She looked around, and she said (quietly so as not to embarrass me, I think), “This is the cleanest I’ve ever seen your house.  I like it.”  I wasn’t sure what to say.  I’m sure she also saw my Day Of The Dead altar, which still stands with it’s sugar skulls, and it’s iconic crucifix flanked by pillar candles.  I’m not sure she recognized the ceramic bride and groom that she and I picked out together twenty-two years ago to sit on top of my wedding cake, and which now represents the broken marriage I tried so hard to fix for so many years.  There it sat, on my altar, as my mother praised my clean house, and I found myself wordless.

“Thank you,” I finally said, but those were the wrong words.  They were the only words I had, however, and I gave them to her, because in the end, she did and she does her best, and I suppose that is all any of us can say.  I know that she loves me.  Special Man laughed when I told him many months ago, about the birthday party I had when I was ten, that nobody came to, except for my mother who stood at the end of our big table and took pictures of me, alone, in a party dress.  I smiled for the camera, and she was being a good mother, taking pictures of her oldest daughter.  She was trying.

I wish I knew where those pictures were.