The Sunflower State

I’m delighted that cousin Sharon now has mom’s car and cruses around Lawrence in it just like my mom and her mom did many years ago. Mom loved her times with Aunt Jo and the little red car knows its way around town in Lawrence.

I’ve realized that the car is really the only material thing of mom’s left in Kansas because the house is sold and all of her furnishings have been relocated. It was a big surprise to me when I had so much resistance and sadness when the Estate Sale finally took place. I knew all along that it was the best solution for the situation and was well planned but it kind of knocked me out when Opening Day was announced. My original intention was to contact friends and let them know when it would take place so they could buy their memorabilia of sorts. When the time came I couldn’t face it.

I couldn’t stop the vision of strangers milling around the house –  just picking up this and that and wondering if it was a good buy. Mom’s  home was filled with personal possessions that had been cared for and deeply loved for a lifetime and now everything was just up for grabs. I began to imagine Unidentified Shoppers wandering through the house and deciding which of these Treasures  was a “good deal”. It’s no wonder that the Estate Sale companies don’t want the owners around at the time of the sale. In the end the neighbors were the only ones who knew about the sale day and that’s because they could see the signs posted outside. In hindsight I wish I would have let others know about it and perhaps some of mom’s personal things could have been rescued. I just couldn’t face it at the time and then suddenly –  it was all over. All along I knew the line needed to be drawn somewhere and it was never going to be easy. On a brighter note I got a message from Paul and Denise,  the neighbors across the street, the day after the sale. It included a photo of their daughter, Lydia, wearing mom’s Hello Kitty robe. That was a much better final version of the Estate Sale for me.

I’ve been back home in California for almost five months and it’s still very hard for me to let go of Kansas. Most of the time I know that I really don’t have to. Realities from my recent years spent in Kansas are now being transformed into wonderful Memories and they are mine to keep and add to my childhood memories of  summer family visits to Grandma and Grandpa’s in Wellington. Guy and I will eventually go back to Wellington to place mom’s Cremains (a new word introduced to my vocabulary!) in the historic cemetery there where her mother and father and our father wait.

Day by day I am settling back into my California life and trying to find a way that I can keep my Mom Connection alive and thriving in its new role. I’m certainly still processing it all – in fact I’ve hardly started.  I have a running inner joke with myself when I hear “I’m so sorry to hear you lost your mom” as though one day I might find her somewhere. Is she pictured on a flyer tacked to a telephone pole with “Lost Mom” written below her picture?  Perhaps there are little tear-outs with my phone number in case anyone has any information about her whereabouts.

It seems like every day I have some new version of what this is all about for me.  I may eventually get comfortable with this Daily News – something new each day that will help me carry her with me wherever this all is taking me.