7 May 2024

A belated Happy Mother’s Day to all. This was a very sad one for me, as it is the first one spent without my own mother. Normally, I would call her in the morning and wish her a good day, and then we would gossip a bit. Nothing major. Work. Family. Gardening. I would try to steer her away from politics, which was sometimes hard seeing as she hated the former President (as do I). But going down that path would inevitably end up elevating the blood pressure of us both. And I still harbor a deep resentment that the last conversation which I had with my father right before he passed was wasted on that man. And so, we would endeavor to talk about pleasanter things. It wasn’t an onerous task. How I miss those little talks now that she’s gone.

If we’re being honest, though, we are never far from either of our parents no matter the distance between us in either time or space. We carry them both inside our bodies within our DNA, and inside our minds as part of a lifetime of accumulated teachings, experiences, and emotions. We are memories made flesh, after all.

I’m not very good at remembering my dreams. Upon awakening, they seem to vanish like the morning mist over still waters. But I think that I still speak with her in those twilight hours before dawn when the veil between life and afterlife is at its thinnest. I think that she’s still asking if that man has gone to prison yet and nagging me to hurry up and retire. LOL. Soon to both, mom. Soon.

— Να εχεις μια ωραια μερα. —