8 years ago today

This marks the anniversary of my mother's quadruple bi-pass surgery. She used to celebrate today as a second birthday.

One of the doctors (my sister would remember which one) told her that the surgery should increase her life by 5-7 years. I don't know how much mom remembered those numbers, but I wish he'd said 15-20 years instead, just in case the number did actually have an influence. She started to fail almost exactly 7 years after the procedure.

Someone pointed out to me today that some people hear a number like that and it becomes their reality, and some people hear a number like that and it becomes the odds that they're going to beat.


So, I'm cleaning up our office at home and run across a design book on country homes that had belonged to Mom. It's full of beautiful photos but not my style, and so I'm pondering whether I should donate it to the school rummage sale or trade it in at the used book store, when I notice that several of the pages are neatly dog-eared. It pulls me up short. Those were the pages Mom especially liked, apparently, and for a minute I just stand there wondering what element of what chintz pillowed, wickered, antique-scattered bedroom called to her. Did she plan to mimic it in one of her rooms? Had she already incorporated elements of this book into her house? Only she would know, but I still don't have her new phone number, the belongings have scattered to the children and charities, and the house is inhabited by a renter with her own pictures on the walls.

This isn't the first time this kind of thing has happened, and it won't be the last. Hell, I don't even need a phone number. An email address would be fine.