Mom knew many of you personally, therefore you have some guess as to how much she loved you. I’m sure she loved you more than you know. Also – I can say with absolute confidence – that for those of you who did not meet her, she would have loved you as well. There was something about Mom that caused her to look beyond flaws and blemishes, beyond someone’s problems, beyond anything. Something in Mom led her accept and appreciate others in impossible ways.

As a proud son, I could go on about her virtues, though I must admit, part of me is far more interested in what you all have to say. For me, this curiosity has made the lead-up to today more enjoyable. Public speaking isn’t exactly my thing anyway.

I lived 3,000 miles away when Mom opted for early retirement, and only later did I learn her primary reason, or the ways in which that reason would shape the rest of her life. I had no sense of the difficulty accepting the diagnosis of cancer, nor the appointments and stress that follow, nor do I have any genuine concept of how radiation and chemotherapy feels.

The second time Mom’s cancer arose, I was back living in The Fan, focused primarily on the health of my father, who was entrenched in his own battle with lung caner. If Mom could have avoided being “an inconvenience” to me – or “a burden”, as she most often put it – then I suspect she would have. I was fortunate given my new proximity to see her on a daily basis. Therefore, it was difficult for Mom hide from me her sudden needs for surgery: one to remove a collection of lymph nodes, another to remove one of her breasts.  

Soon after her mastectomy, Mom’s doctors suspected cancer had made it’s way to her digestive system, which in turn led to another surgery to remove eight inches of her colon. A study of this section revealed the odd growth in question to be benign; the surgery itself might have been benign, if not for the blood clotting issues that developed in her legs, due to inadequate care in the hospital as she recovered.

Like cancer, blood clots began to consume her well-being, forcing upon her yet another surgery – this time, to have a stop placed within her bloodstream, so that the clots could not enter her heart and kill her. She was forced to learn that for every day until she died she would need the viscosity of her blood tightly controlled; this thinning, of course, did little to reduce already frequent nose bleeds. She was forced as well to wear compression hose in order to prevent hyper-swelling of her lower extremities. I badly sprained my ankle once. It was uncomfortable. I have no idea how hard it would be to live year after year with that sort of pressure placed upon half my body.

Besides the pain caused by movement, Mom’s sleeping became more and more difficult – naturally she was forced to elevate her legs as much as possible. She slept alone on her mother’s refurbished sofa with three or four pillows underneath her feet. The discomfort from her blood clots did little to compliment her cat-napping nature, or her need for frequent trips to the bathroom. It did little to help her previous wounds, such as the constant pain from tendons in her left foot – a result of a botched surgery, intended to alleviate a lesser pain, long ago. The clotting issues did little to help her battles with pneumonia and her battles with bronchitis, both of which went for years improperly diagnosed. That tickling, unsettling feeling in one’s throat. Those uncontrollable bouts of coughing. I find them annoying enough the few times a year. For Mom they were routine.

My father was an exceptionally fine man, but it happens in life that sometimes people who once fell in love grow apart. He moved out when Lauren and I were at the older end of middle school. To my knowledge Mom never went on a date after. She took comfort in the lives of others, particularly her friends. Over the years many of her dearest friends passed. Losing two of her best friends – her father, and then later, her mother – were especially hard on Mom, who drove tens of thousands of miles back and forth from Richmond to North Carolina in order to aid and comfort them in their final years.  

When she could effectively hide her emotions she tried, but ultimately she wore her heart across her face. She often cried when she was touched, or when someone else was. I regret witnessing the times her tears fell not in joy, particularly when they were brought on from my own actions.  I can’t speak for Lauren – who, in her youth, was far beyond her years – but in my younger days I put Mom through the proverbial ringer; on several occasions, in several emergency rooms by my side. Never once, though, did she stop loving me for who I was.

With so much emotional and physical strain it’s only fair to note that she did not rely on any vices let alone any remotely effective medication to ease her pain. Except for maybe a glass of wine or two each year, she did not drink (contrary to my Facebook posts, joking that she was “GETTIN HAMMERED” at breakfast, or downing an entire Jumbo margarita at dinner). She confessed to me that she smoked a cigarette once in college, in an effort to stay awake studying for exams, but that she didn’t like it. Most significantly, she had an aversion to strong pain medication – the nausea that pills caused her was profound enough to list them as an allergy at the start of each of her countless medical appointments.  All the scars of surgery – both on the outside and inside her body – all the swelling, all the tingling, all the discomfort – they could not have offered her much comfort. Instead they presented her with very real sense of pain.

When Mom’s cancer came back in November we had hopes of her beating it again. I don’t blame cancer for taking her any more than I blame a tree for being a tree.

It takes little imagination to consider that once Mom’s descent took shape, it was difficult on her, though, in discussing it with everyone else, she accepted death with unbelievable pride and gratitude. Along with the pain of knowing one will soon pass. there is the pain of passing itself. I can’t claim to know how she felt in her final hours, or final minutes, or final seconds. If she could hear, though, she would have heard reassurance that she was loved, that everything’s going to be alright, and that it’s okay to let go.

I share this with you all because phrases like “an eight-year battle with cancer” and “she died peacefully” come a little too easy – they serve well in brevity, but in perspective, they are hardly honest. To really know Mom is to in part understand the day-to-day battles she suffered and endured, and beyond those battles, how much she ultimately loved. 

Behind her beaming smile, behind her twinkling blue eyes, behind her winces, behind her tears, she absorbed all pain she could around her, and in turn supplied unconditional care to those she could. More than being here today, Mom would want you give others the benefit of the doubt, if that doubt was hope; to give others a second chance, because you never really know what someone is going through. 

As you hear the following reflections and stories about Mom, and as you continue to remember her after today, I hope you take comfort in knowing that loving someone is possible even when you think it’s not. That even in your darkest moments, you were loved by at least someone.  

Thank you all for being here today.