Life As A Fire Wife

Yesterday marked 8 years since my mom passed away. How is that even possible? My baby was getting on the school bus for the first time yesterday and my mom never even met him, she never knew of him. I felt a melancholy wash over me yesterday and the day before. I heard a song on the radio that didn’t make me think of her but as I was singing the lyrics, “When your legs don’t work like they used to before,” and all of a sudden I heard this love song in a completely different way and I thought about life 9 years ago. 9 years ago when my mom got sick, her body filled with cancer, nothing was working well, not her legs, not her blood, not her organs, so when I heard those lyrics, I was all done, and I knew the season was coming for me that I remember vividly, the season of saying goodbye to my mom. I also recalled the early days of mourning. I was home with 2 under 2, and as soon as my hubby walked in the door, I told him what needed to be heated up for dinner and I drove down to the seawall, ran my 2 miles, while thanking God for every part of my body that worked, and when I was done running and done praising, I would get into my car and cry while I drove home. Yesterday after all 3 boys were on the bus, I went to the gym, and while I wasn’t going to run because I have been nursing an injury, I ran, and I praised God for my body that works, and I prayed to God for everyone I know who is sick with cancer or any other disease that makes their body not work.

Lately I’ve been looking at life through the perspective that tomorrow isn’t guaranteed, people get sick, kids get sick, but while I am here and I am healthy and my family is here and healthy, we should have fun, I’m dancing in the supermarket aisles, singing into my broom, remembering to put some music on to be the soundtrack of our lives. Memory making isn’t over just because my kids are out of diapers, memory making happens every day. So yesterday I took my 9 year old to stop and shop and we spent about $25 on everything we needed for ice cream sundaes to top waffles for dinner, because my mom would have gotten them ice cream for dinner and spoiled them rotten. I even ignored the high fructose corn syrup label because my mom wouldn’t have read the labels unless she was checking for cholesterol.