Can you remember once upon a time?

It took me a while to accept the fact that once upon a time never comes again. And thus, remembering will have to do.

Once upon a time, March 21^st was the day Mother would awaken to breakfast in bed, a dozen red roses, lots of singing and hugs and presents from Daddy and me. We treated birthdays as both intimate and big moments. We saw one another as gifts that God had given to us and the world.

Once upon a time, Mother was a single parent while Daddy was away at war and disabled in a Veterans Hospital. Mother lived in God’s grace as she taught me survival skills like walking and talking and reading and behaving. We were a queen and a princess living in a castle which, to others, was Cincinnati, Ohio Public Housing. At night, she took long bus rides to the university to earn her teaching certification in order to improve our lives. Her best friend lived next door in the castle and came to sit with, feed and love me into my nightly dreams.

With Daddy safely back with us, Mother spent the next thirty years teaching, empowering and encouraging young children. She taught them what “more” looked like when they used their God-given talents. At her memorial service, many of her young, turned professional beneficiaries provided loving testimonies. They were dressed in their realized dreams as doctors, surgeons, lawyers, nurses, teachers, principals and bankers.

Once upon a time, Mother watched a man put his hand in mine and say he loved me so. She wondered if I had learned that, “Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things. Love never ends.”[1] She hoped I understood that sometimes the unlikely happens; that the sky is blue, and it is also pink; that his love and my love may not behave the same.

Mother did not teach me that time is the only thing we cannot capture, lock up and stop. And too soon Mother’s once upon a time never came again. She did not teach me how to live without her. I hold on tightly to her values of respect, compassion, honesty, responsibility and restraint hoping I will feel her essence when I do well. And so if I could tell the world one thing now it would be, ” A mother is she who can take the place of all others but whose place no one else can take.” (2)

Happy Birthday, Mother!

[1] http//www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Corinthians+13&version=ESV

[1] http://www.goodmorningquote.com/28-short-inspiring-mother-daughter-quotes/Cardinal Mermillod

    Until next time, remember,

• You are not alone.

• You are not your circumstances.

• You have everything within you to live a purpose-filled life.