Jeanne Marie

This week marks the 10 year anniversay of my mom's death. I didn't remember the anniversaries at first; I believe they were just too painful. But now, my heart won't let me forget. I've had a heavy sadness all week, and today it occured to me.
I am sad that many of my friends will not even recognize her name. Most of you, including Finley, did not get to meet her.
So this blog is going to be for me.
Please feel free to skip over it, but I need to remember my mom today and give myself permission to be sad.
These are just a few of my favorite pictures of her. My grandfather was an amateur photographer,
and I am so grateful to him for every box of photos. I thought these baby photos were poetic. Going back over them I realize how much my Mom and my Norah look alike as babies. Thank you, Father. I wonder if she will continue to grow to look like her Grandma. Mom, Norah and I have the same eyes. And norah has darker hair than Fin or I did, like my Mom. I, like many children, think no one was as beautiful as my mother, so I can think of no none I'd rather my Norah resemble.
We are going to the Cathedral this weekend to light a candle for Mom. Going into a Catholic Church is like entereing the heritage of my family. It's like going home, though I don't fit in as well as I did when I was younger. My mom loved going to mass. She said that no matter how hard our week was or how much we had argued, when we went to mass on Sunday, everything was somehow okay. The walls fell down and we were able to remember how much we loved each other and how for so many years we were all the other one had.