Saying Goodbye

For such a short month, February sure has a way of leaving its mark. In the past, my problems with February have included gross weather (we never saw the sun during this month in Missouri), Valentine's Day (we'd rather not, thank you), and the seemingly endless wait for spring.

This February was crueler than usual. On February 16, we lost Jeremy's mother, Carol. Her husband and children were all by her side.

Carol Ann Day was a wife, a mother and mother-in-law, a grandmother and GREAT grandmother (which she preferred to the more official great-grandmother), a sister, an aunt. She was a hugger, a quilter, a nickel-machine gambler, a martini drinker. She was the kind of woman about whom people say, "She never met a stranger," and as a result she accumulated an impressive number of stories about folks she met along the way. Just as impressive, if not more so, is the number of stories other folks accumulated about her over the years. In a different era, she might have been called a broad or a dame–and in any era, I don't think she would have minded.

When we gathered with family and friends to remember Carol, there were of course a lot of tears; she is deeply missed and always will be. But I think it says a great deal that many of the conversations I took part in or heard snippets of involved laughter. Carol loved to laugh and loved to make people laugh, often with bad or bawdy jokes. While I don't think anyone was repeating those in particular, I'm sure many people were sharing their stories and memories and finding that the ones that came to mind all brought them joy.

During the eulogy and other remarks at the visitation, people constantly returned to one of Carol's favorite pastimes: quilting. Many of the mourners had at least one of the hundreds of quilts she hand sewed over the years. We've got several– the one she made for my college graduation, the one she made for our wedding, the one she made for Oscar as a newborn, plus a number of others. Quilts are a useful symbol of the qualities we most associate with her: the love and care for her family, her dedication to keeping her home clean and comfortable, her willingness to tackle and complete hard tasks, her warmth and affection.

Although the last few weeks have been hard, we are grateful for all of the time we got to spend with Jeremy's dad and siblings, which certainly made processing this new reality a little less lonely, if not any easier. When we all met in January for family pictures and a belated family Christmas, I don't think any of expected we would be back together quite so soon to say goodbye. And the memories we made since her passing are just the first of the many we'll be making without her, but they won't diminish the ones we are so lucky to have made with her over the course of a lifetime.

Jeremy may post his own reflections at another time, but for now he and the whole family appreciate the outpouring of emotional support we've received. Thank you for your thoughts, prayers, and gestures of care.