Thinking About Mom Again

This is probably the most personal thing I’ll ever post here and I understand if you choose not to read it.

Death is part of life. Facing the death of a loved one, or even our own death, is not unique to boomers, but we are at an age where this piece of reality stares back more often. Death is a bigger part of our lives than when we were younger. Obviously.

I had the best mother a son could ever want, and I don’t think I realized it till the last few years of her life. I left my hometown more than 25 years ago and my entire contact with Mom over that period was phone calls on holidays, 5 or 6 letters a year, a similar number of visits home, and messages back and forth via my sister.

Mom was a bit judgmental and didn’t approve of or understand many of my life choices. Yet she tried hard to accept things just because I was her son.

I’ve lived in five cities since leaving New Orleans and she marveled over each of my relocations. She found a way to visit me in three of those places and regularly asked about life in each.

My serial marrying was a disappointment to her (my quote for nine years has been: “third time’s a charm” or “three strikes, you’re out”). I don’t know how to spell that Cajun French half-grunt, half-snort word she uttered upon hearing of each breakup. Yet each time I would marry again, she wanted to meet my wife. She would ask about her and expected updates.

Mom lived her last five years in a nursing home. We had little choice. She hated every minute but grew to understand the lack of options. She made it clear how grateful she was for visits from family and friends. Her brain power was decent till the last year, and my best last memory of her was the 94th birthday party we gave her. My worst last memory was 8 months later when she didn’t know who I was.

The thought of what she went through during her last 4 days makes me ill. The nursing home did not evacuate till after Hurricane Katrina had passed. The idiots who staffed that place realized the electricity wasn’t coming back on and four inches of water IN the place wasn’t such a good thing. First they moved across the street to a hospital, then across the state to another nursing home. She survived the storm and the evacuation but died the next day. Her death could have happened that day with or without Katrina, but that doesn’t give me any comfort.

Six week later we were finally able to give her the kind of funeral she would have wanted, in a church with family and friends. One of our favorite pictures of her was placed on the casket and the three of her paintings that survived the storm were displayed in the lobby.

I talk for a living, yet delivering that eulogy was the most difficult 3-minute speech I’ve ever delivered. Here is what I said:


When we met with Father Ralph a few days ago, he pointed us in a wonderful direction for today. He said this should be a celebration of Mom’s life.

Ann Marie and I are so lucky to have had her as our mother, and there are so many things we could say about her. But in my mind, four things stand out above the rest:

1) She had a great sense of humor. She loved a good laugh. One of Ann Marie’s last memories of her was a few days before Katrina. Mom was sitting there at the nursing home laughing. Ann Marie doesn’t really know what she was laughing at, but she was having a good ole laugh.

2) Mom loved to travel. And with the evacuation to north Louisiana and her return here in this casket, she traveled more during her last three days of life and the weeks since her death than she had traveled in decades. She is probably having a good laugh about that right now.

3) Mom paid me and Ann Marie the greatest compliment a mother could pay a child … many times. She married late in life, especially for her generation, at age 39. She told us many times, including at her 94th birthday party, that her life really didn’t begin till she was in her 40s, when she had us.

4) One of the most important things in life is family. Up until the last year or so, she kept up with what was going on in your lives … the cousins, your kids, your grandkids. The Mary Kay sisters, the red car ... she even got to ride in the red Mary Kay car and she was aware of things that day.

And it means a lot to Ann Marie and I that you are here sharing this day with us.

Mom, we love you.



You made it to the end of this post. Thanks for letting me share this with you. The next post will probably be about cars or television again. See you next time.