An ode to my mother

RIB’S RAMBLINGS

Mark Ribble

This September will mark 20 years since my mother died.

She was only 76 and it’s hard to believe I’m now only 16 years shy of that age.

I often sit and think about how she would have reacted to all that’s going on in today’s world.

I’ve also often said that she and my dad were blessed to have been long gone when this pandemic descended upon the world.

One thing I do know, is that the growing family that they started together after they got married in 1944, was — and would still be — my mom’s pride and joy.

They raised four kids in that big old clapboard house at Point Pelee.

Family was everything to her. She doted on her grandkids like nobody else I’ve ever seen. Heck, she even doted on my siblings and I when we were growing up. She did so many things that we just took for granted.

We also took for granted that she’d be around forever, but in the spring of 2001, it became apparent that she would not.

I was going through a transitional period in my life at the time and looking back, I regret not just putting my life completely on hold and spending more time with her.

After all that’s what she would have done for me.

She was in the hospital for much of her last months on this earth and as a family, we were there for her. We all visited very regularly, but as time slipped away, I was torn between trying to get my life back together and wrapping my head around the fact that my mom was not going to be around forever.

As my grandkids grow from toddlers to young people with so much ahead of them, I wonder how she would have interacted with them at this stage in their lives.

She was a true champion of her kids photograph of an unidentified family, standing outside the Cedar Beach Drug Store, was taken in and her grandkids. None of us could do any wrong in her eyes and she’d give her last breath to make sure we could thrive.

Of course, we have pictures and a small amount of video that can refresh our memories from time-to-time, but it’s not the same.

Every once in a while, I feel like I can hear her voice calling out to the kids in the back yard and I picture her showing up in that little green Mercury Topaz, overflowing with break-open Nevada tickets and cigarette ashes, and showering the kids with candy and love.

She comes up often in conversation when we’re together as a family.

We joke about some of her more colourful phrases and language and that brings a smile to my face.

As we observe the 20th Mother’s Day without her on Sunday, a piece of me will be thinking of all the things she did to make our lives better.

If you’ve still got your mom, make sure you celebrate her this Sunday in whatever way you can in this crazy world of 2021.

She deserves it and so do you.