Pickles for Mom

It's nearly eight months now since my Mom died ...almost long enough to bring a baby to birth, and I still haven't cried. Not for lack of missing her - but ...I don't know, partially sensing her presence so close every day, and partially denial of her passing. I haven't visited her grave since her burial - her spirit is not there, it never was.

But lately the grief has started to make itself felt. I listen to the confidences of a friend's 21-year-old daughter, and hear myself at her age, and long to mother her as I wish I had let Mom mother me. I'd been too immersed in separating from Mom at that time, too focused on becomng myself, as I see my friend's daughter doing.

And somehow, when we did try to connect, it was a struggle...I was in full flight from my parents' Old World Catholicism at that time, pursuing Quaker, Eastern and Earth-based paths, a source of great concern from their traditional perspective. Where they were Republican conservative, I was far-left liberal...if there was a way in which I could go 180 degrees from their path, it seemed I was taking it.

Mom and I did try to connect...I know she worked long and hard in her efforts to understand my evolving perspective. How many near-misses we had...each time  we tried to talk, she'd make an effort to ask about my views, try them on, and then decide she just couldn't - they were too far divorced from her own. It wasn't until months after her passing that my god-sister told me of Mom's confiding "I don't understand Phila's path - it's not the path I wanted her to take - but it's not wrong."

So much of what I became is thanks to her legacy - not the ideologies that she espoused ferociously in the editorial pages of our local and regional newspapers, but the example I saw her living. Passionate love of nature - of forests and gardens, animals of all sorts (how she loved my houseful of cats) - open-handed hospitality to all - respect for all views - and deep spirituality. Though she was very traditionally Catholic, she was also a visionary and mystic who deeply questioned and lived her faith.

The last deep conversation we had was in the hospital, roughly two weeks before her passing. I had shown her a paper that I wrote for my Master's program - one that explained the passion I felt for nature and indigenous Earth-based spiritual traditions. She read it and looked at me thoughtfully and said "I don't quite understand this, but I honor your spiritual path and your work. Keep following your path and your vocation."

I cried all the way home.

The morning she died - 6:00 in the morning, Thanksgiving Sunday - I came home from saying goodbye to her in the nursing home. I looked at my house, wondering where I could find her legacy here. Call it her spirit touching me, perhaps - the thought came "I don't have to look - I AM her legacy, it's in everything I do."

Since then I need only to check in to hear that inward wisdom and feel her warm hug. To cry seems superfluous somehow - as if I were denying that presence which feels so real.

And today, Dad came over with baby cucumbers from his garden asking if I would make Mom's mother's recipe for two-day pickles. I measured out the spices and the water with tears flowing, feeling two generations of women's hands guiding my own. The brine is coming to a boil as I write.

Mom, Nana Lucas, the legacy continues. I miss you.