A Phone Call From Mom

It’s been a year since you’ve been gone.  I know where you went, but I really don’t know how you got there.  What path did you take?  How did you know where to go?  Did someone guide you, or meet you?  The pathway that we all must follow seems so elusive and vague.  Following it must seem as though you’re jumping off a diving board into a crystal clear pool of blue water.  You just have to let go and fall.  There is no doubt the water is warm and, likewise, there is no doubt that Heaven is a place of no sorrow, no tears, and no sickness.  I know you’re there but I still just don’t know how you got there.

In the past year there has not been a single day, a single hour that I have not had you in my heart and mind.  You have been closer to me this past year than you probably were at any other time.  Did you notice?  Could you feel my love surrounding you, holding you?  All the conversations I have had with you over the last months have ran the gamut from joyous to melancholy.  We were best friends and now I have to call you by long distance to talk about the things that matter most.  All those afternoons of simply sitting and watching the shadows crawl across the patio, the cracks serving as a sun dial marking the time, were the simple treasures of life that are forever locked away.  Those days are dark now.

When I heard the news that you were gone I immediately recalled the phone call we shared just minutes before you left.  It wasn’t a long call but it has proven to be a priceless call.  It was the last time we were together, talking, sharing, and laughing as we had since my childhood.  That call will remain with me until I join you and then we can continue where we left off.  I know you’ll remember what we were talking about.  I can’t say that I will but we can make do.  It seems we never lacked for something to talk about.

The last year has been different.  Not seeing the word “Mom” on my call list on my cell phone has taken a while to get used to.  But, don’t worry Mom.  Just in case I need to call you in a hurry I still have your number on speed dial.  I haven’t deleted it.  It’s been the last year that I have learned the value, the irreplaceable value of being able to call you on a whim and talk about everything and nothing.  It’s a pity we learn those things too late.  We never learn the meaty lessons of life until we have to apply them to other things, things other than the one thing that seems to matter most.  I can scan my call list up and down and your name is nowhere to be found and won’t be.  No voicemail.  No missed calls.  Only silence.

That I know of I have no recordings of your voice.  While that would be nice to have, it isn’t necessary for me to remember your voice.  Not only have I heard it on countless phone calls, but I have also dreamed it so many times in the last year that I could not possibly forget its tone.  I only wish I could know that on some astral plane of space-time that those dreams were real and that our meetings actually occurred.  Even as brief as they were, for that fleeting moment we were once again together even if it were in a dream.  Once we’re together again you won’t have to wait for me to find you.  Your voice will guide me to you.

I have often wondered what we’d talk about if I called you now.  I don’t know what I would say.  There would be so much to say that I’m afraid the words would somehow stumble so clumsily over one another that I would be unable to say anything.  I can still hear you call out “Anthion”, which would always send me on a quest to find you.  Mom, I think it’s important for you to know that you haven’t been relegated to only existing in photo albums and fading memories.  There have been more times than I could ever hope to count that I have wanted…needed…to call you.  There is something soothing and calming about a mother’s voice.  Your voice always chased away the shadows of the night and made my fears melt.  You calmed me and made me know that no matter what; you would be there with me.  Now, that may be true spiritually, but physically it is no longer.

Calling you was always an adventure because I never knew where you’d be or what you’d be doing.  I liked that.  It made me know that you were living life to its fullest. In the decades of yesterday we were always trapped in circumstances we didn’t create; yet we were always happy together.  We knew full well how to make lemonade of life’s lemons.  As long as we were together the rain clouds that loomed on the horizon always seemed to be just a way to water flowers of springtime joy.  Like me, you did finally find joy, but joy came late. And rather than be dismayed over its tardiness you only squeezed life all the harder to get the last remaining drop of passion you could.  Life was not going to cheat you.  Life is not going to cheat me either.  You raised me better than to allow that to happen.

Of course, we only have technology to thank for all this rampant communication.  I always knew that no matter the location, time, or circumstance, I could call your cell and hear your voice.  Had we been in other places of time our communication would have been severely limited. We would have not talked at all, but rather written lengthy letters gushing with the tidbits of each day’s happenings.  We would have left nothing out, left no stone unturned to make each other feel included.  Letters are no match for the warm voice of a mother or child, of best buddies, talking and sharing.  Regrettably, while you were here your phone rang far too few times.  It didn’t ring nearly enough to prepare me for the time it wouldn’t ring at all.  Will technology prepare me for that?  No, I think not.

So, tell me how often your phone rings now.  How often do you have to charge it, or do you have to charge it at all?  What kind of signal do you have where you are?  Of course, it’s my guess you don’t use your cell phone much at all.  Where you are has to be a nice place, full of all sorts of wonders and awe-inspiring sights.  But, Mom I can’t help but be a little suspicious of where you are.  I mean, I keep thinking you’re looking around at all the great things and saying to yourself, “If Anthion were here he would be taking that apart to see how it works.”  I know that no matter how complete the place you are in may be it’s not as complete as it could be without me.  I know you loved me that much.

We’ll talk again one day.  I’m not sure when that will be. I know that you will have all sorts of tales to tell and marvelous things to show me.  We’ll have to spend the day together catching up.  There will be all sorts of things I’ll want to know.  I’m sure I’ll be full of questions.  But, that’s ok since we’ll have a long time together to catch up in.  We’ll make coffee and simply have a lazy day together.  Who knows, we may not even get out of our PJs.  One thing I am hopeful for.  In this new place I will be eternally grateful that this life’s troubles will be absent.  I do, however, hope the life’s lessons I’ve learned won’t be.  I hope that this time I will cherish the time we have together and if we can by some means recall the lessons we’ve learned then our life in Heaven will be different.

Mom, in some ways the past year has passed quickly.  In other ways it has seemed almost excruciatingly slow.  Just in case you need to call, my phone is always close.  Those times I may have been too busy or too distracted won’t matter any more.  I miss you and the hole in my heart hurts still.  I can never replace you with mere memories but that’s all I have of you now.  All I have is a whisper, a shadow, a wisp of what once was.  You won’t be touring through our home commenting on new decorations and paint.  You won’t be at the dining room table eating breakfast in your robe.  The one solace I have is to know that love knows neither human presence nor spiritual bounds.  It transcends all human limits and by that I know my love isn’t in vain.  I know that your love is not only ever present with me but it’s vibrant and alive.  Your love will see me through.