In January and in July, my great grandmothers started visiting me as strikingly red cardinals.

This year my grandparents grieved their mothers. In their 70s, finally meeting a momless world.

One matriarch served as a guiding light for the generations that spawned around her. As step-in cheerleader, fill-in child rearer, head chef, queen of every card game, and high priestess of happy hour, she ruled with laughter and cocktails.

It was at her funeral that I witnessed wet eyes gather for the pure reflection of her joy. My world truly seems less saturated just knowing that her feet do not grace the sand she used to survey. A sudden emptiness I couldn’t anticipate.

The other mother served as a looming weight. A means I only got to know through matters of her meanness. The strain she placed on those I loved, even from afar, crafted her lore.

Her passing supplied a series of problems needing solved. There was no grand coming together. She has simply slipped into the next phase of life. A packet of past pain is left behind with little knowledge on where it should be shelved.

Eight months now of contemplative grief, of strangeness, of familial shifts.

Grandpa’s mom chirps all around me. I waltz with her wisdom when I get bogged down by the burdens of life crafting. I remember her in her glory. In her pursuit of perfecting party planning, just to throw themed theatrics with her beloved sisters.

I remember that we remembered her radiance. Loretta left no fantastic legacy aside from effortlessly loving the life and lives around her. She was thrilled to be here and we were all the better for it.

I never met Nana’s mom. Carol shared no interest in relating with my relatives. I am told of her fearful and distrusting nature. Her recent departure seemingly offers a balancing act, one I am currently considering inevitable. It's been a bewildering honor to watch the dimming of a true wonder in January dissolve lingering lacerations by July.

A year for motherhood and its mysteries. These women join my angelic assembly of ancestors. The ethereal council grows and I am left to juggle the differing influences they have had on me, the seen and the unseen.

Much more to be written about the Moms that have formed and fallen around me.

Until next time.

hallelujah

Entry #2

Going of the Greats