For Catherine M

[TheresaThoma]

Catherine, I wanted to share this poem with you. My aunt showed it to me after my dad (her brother) died. To me the first and last lines pretty much sum it up.
[color=#F88000][font=Arial, sans-serif][size=1]Away[/size][/font][/color]



[size=4][color=#333333][font=Arial, sans-serif]I cannot say, and I will not say
That he is dead--. He is just away!

With a cheery smile, and a wave of the hand
He has wandered into an unknown land,

And left us dreaming how very fair
It needs must be, since he lingers there.

And you-- O you, who the wildest yearn
For the old-time step and the glad return--,

Think of him faring on, as dear
In the love of There as the love of Here;

And loyal still, as he gave the blows
Of his warrior-strength to his country's foes--.

Mild and gentle, as he was brave--,
When the sweetest love of his life he gave

To simple things--: Where the violets grew
Blue as the eyes they were likened to,

The touches of his hands have strayed
As reverently as his lips have prayed:

When the little brown thrush that harshly chirred
Was dear to him as the mocking-bird;

And he pitied as much as a man in pain
A writhing honey-bee wet with rain--.

Think of him still as the same, I say:
He is not dead-- he is just away! [/font][/color][/size]

[morostheos]

I just saw this, not sure how I missed it before. I'm so sorry to hear of your loss. You and your family are in my prayers!

[Lil Red]

Catherine - I've really been enjoying the stories of your mom that you've been sharing on facebook.

[CatherineM]

I'm doing it for me, and my niece and nephew who were too young to remember much of this stuff. I'm a story-teller. That's what I do. My mom and I had a major love/hate relationship. Mostly because we were so much alike. More so than I have ever been willing to admit. I have never dealt with grief well. After my dad died I caught a bus to Mexico and slept on a beach for a long time. I only ate fish I caught and collected water off a tarp. It was summer so it rained every afternoon. I don't remember now why I even came home. That deserted beach has a resort on it now, so I'm trying to deal with my mom's death differently.

[Didacus]

Prayers. She must have been quite a woman to raise someone like you Catherine.

[IcePrincessKRS]

[quote name='Didacus' timestamp='1343950993' post='2461755']
Prayers. She must have been quite a woman to raise someone like you Catherine.
[/quote]

[CatherineM]

My mom. She had scarlet fever as a kid and it stunted her growth and killed her right ear and right kidney. When she was 17, she had to have her right kidney removed in a time before antibiotics or dialysis, by ether. She carried an upside down Y shaped scar two feet long on her back from it. She lost her fiancé on the Bataan Death March. She married their Baptist minister's son and he got another woman pregnant while stationed elsewhere during the war. Her family oestricized her because of the divorce. Her next husband was Catholic and Cherokee which enraged her family. That may have been why she married him.

That husband had been in Audie Murphy's unit in WWII, and saw so much action that when he got sent to Korea, he had a complete psychotic break. He eventually jumped out of a six floor window at a hotel after escaping from a VA mental hospital leaving my mom with two toddlers. She worked three jobs to support them. When my brothers were 3 and 5, she met my dad and spent 30 years with him.

We were poor, but she seemed to just make stuff work out. She buried three grandsons along the way. She survived lung cancer when no one did. She survived breast cancer. She survived a heart attack and a stroke and some scary leg blood clots. She outlived all her younger sisters and cousins. She lived in her own apartment until two months before her death. She read the newspaper everyday of her life from front to back, including the day she died.

She believed in learning a new skill every year. I do the same because of her example. She and I fought a lot. Mostly because she pushed us to be the best we were capable of. I've never liked being pushed even when I needed it. We got along best when in different area codes.

She was a good friend to everyone who knew her. She was a good mother in law. She was a good grandmother. She was an incredible cook and beautician and seamstress. Mostly she was a great mom and a good example of how a stay at home mom can be a force in a our communities. If she was born today, she could have become a supreme court judge or brain surgeon. Instead, she expected us to.

Her kids became a doctor and a lawyer and union president and computer executive, diesel mechanic and real estate developer. Her grandkids are doctors and lawyers and electricians and accountants. They are mostly good moms and dads first. God only knows what their grandkids will become. Having her blood in their veins gives them a big head start.