The Unthinkable

I sat in the hospital room watching my mother sleep.  She was very restless, I was so relieved that pain had subsided enough to let her sleep.  She opened her eyes and saw me there.   “Why didn’t you wake me? I don’t want to miss the time I have with you.

I told her she had seemed peaceful and I wanted her to rest.  She smiled but I could still see the pain she was experiencing. Then she said, “Jan, I won’t  be going home.” I hesitated..not wanting to go where she was going.... I tried to be funny.  

  “Oh really have you bought a condo somehwhere?”  She smiled and then said, 
  “No I won’t be leaving the hospital this time.”  Tears started to roll down my face.

  “Mom, I can’t imagine life without you, you have always been here.”  Still she just looked at me.  

“You will go on, as I went on when I lost my mother, and as she did when she lost hers. It is a changing of the guard, it is life going on.  Your relationship with Erin will grow stronger, then you will depend on each other and make each other stronger.”  

And sometimes....that doesn’t happen.  You go your separate ways........