Finding the Frosting

Today was the day my mother came home from her trip to Virginia, the trip where she said goodbye to her mother. The trip where she watched the men in her family united to hoist a casket on their shoulders and carry a body that had once carried them. 

As I sat across from my mom, having lunch after picking her up at the airport, I found myself studying her face; memorizing the color-flecks in her blue eyes; taking mental snapshots of her smile; wishing I would never, ever have to think about saying my own good-byes to the woman I call Mama. 

I know that, in reality, we all have to say good-bye to the parents who raised us. We all face the eventuality of becoming orphaned, no matter how old or young we are. But if we're lucky, if we're blessed, we have memories to carry with us of the little things that made them special––the smell of the perfume that they wore, the sound of their laughter, the feel of the calluses on their hands. We find those memories sometimes in the most unexpected places––like the odd whiff of a flower that always adorned the kitchen table; or finding the last splatter of frosting, caked and dried while the very last batch of cakes were baked. They are sweet reminders of what once was, of the moments we were given as gifts, of the time we should treasure and savor.