I wrote and posted the following article elsewhere last year and I decided to repost it again here with a small introduction.
Today would have been my Mum's 69th birthday and I'm just about to go out and remember her by doing some of her favourite things, not quite sure where i'm going to go yet but i'm going to go out for an adventure in my wee silver car which she used to share with my sister and wherever I end up i'm going to have a cappuccino and a disgustingly large and very naughty cake... probably a big freshly made merangue like we used to get and share whilst giggling like naughty school kids and on my way there i'm going to listen to a combination of my favourite songs that remind me of her and her favourite Abba album.
But most importantly of all, i'll be wearing my Poppy and remembering her on this 11th day of the 11th month of the 11th year of this millenium.
Love you Mum x
Poppies for a different kind of remembrance day
by Ross Paterson on Thursday, 11 November 2010 at 01:04
Today would have been my Mum's 68th birthday, and poppies will forever be hers in my eyes. She might not have fought in fields with weapons, but she was the strongest woman i ever had the privilage of knowing and she didn't win her last fight.
Cancer is a cruel and heartless bitch, a scourge on the world and i have lost several family members to it now, none more painful than the loss of my Mum. Taken from me long before her time, just like all those poor young men forced into war to defend our country. I thank them for what they did for our country and I do not mean any dishonour to them when i say this but i shall not be wearing my poppy for them, i wear it for her.
My Mum was a kind, caring woman - not an ounce of selfishness in her body. and the number of people that came to pay their respects at the funeral certainly proved that, there wasn't an empty seat in the church as far as i remember and there were still others that sent cards from over seas who couldn't make it. Hundreds of people were that touched by her life and thought so highly of her. We had a collection for Macmillan Cancer Support that day and we raised more than £800 in her honour! To this very day i am still in awe of how loved she was and i can only hope that when its my time i'll have made even half as much of an impact on the people i encounter along the way as she did.
She did so much for me and for that i will always be eternally grateful, but its some of the smallest simplest things that i miss most of all and i would like to share some of those with you now, like the way she would wake me up singing one of her songs always in the most cheerful of moods. Most parents probably spent many a day yelling at their teenage/student kids to get out of bed and stop being lazy, mine always started my day by making me smile.
The way she repeatedly inflicted her Abba tapes on me in the car on near constant repeat when i was little to the point where i knew the words and exact running order to each one off by heart... and probably still do! when we got a new car with a cd player instead of a tape player she missed her tapes that much that i bought her an Abba greatest hits cd to cheer her up and resigned myself to the fact that i would never be free of the damn songs but at least she would be happy! LOL
The way she bribed me to go swimming with the promise of a blue slush puppie and then how i stopped caring about the slush puppie cause i just loved going swimming with her - and also the discovery of how much fun jacuzzis were - eventually not a lot of time was spent swimming, Mum trained me well at an early age in the arts of relaxation LOL
My Mum was my best friend, not everyone is that lucky in life thats why i take great pride in remembering her life today and why I will always remember her on this day. Remembrance day may have been designed for a completely different purpose, but i don't think any of those soldiers would have minded sharing their day with such a remarkably spectacular woman.
Isabel Paterson I remember you now and forever, Happy Birthday Mum x
No comments:
Post a Comment