Decades

The other day I had to renew my driver's license, required every ten years where I live. Merrily showed up at the DMV to accomplish the task, but left disgruntled. Who IS that woman on my driver's license who looks like my mother?!

Speaking of whom, I just returned from spending two days with her, an experience that has me thinking about her decades. Mother's Day with her turned out to be special in so many ways. I arranged to stay overnight so that we'd have lots of time to talk -- sit on the bed in our jammies and talk about whatever we wanted for as long as we wanted.

Good move. Turned out she needed to talk about the eventuality of her death, which she did in a calm and assured way. I didn't like thinking about her death, yet I find myself so proud of her pragmatism. What an example she is to me! Always has been and I hope will continue for a few years yet. I can tell she is worried about her health and even said she thinks her doctor thinks she has limited time left. We'll see. As my 97-year-old aunt tells her often, they are tough old birds. This fall Mom will reach her 90th birthday if all goes well. When she had her first heart attack at the age of 61, we never expected her to make it this far. Now I have hope that she will make it to 100.

But she has prepared me if she doesn't. It's just the way she is.