December 15, 2024
Kateri Paul
In the poem we just heard, we were reminded of the constants of love and loss. After a couple of challenging weeks at my job (several year series of challenges) my former manager texted me to ask if I was “okay” after the latest in a series of layoffs. After updating him, he texted back: “I guess change is the law of life, sounds dynamic!” And so it is, but at that moment, rather than living into the dynamicism, I would have liked him to take a moment to reflect on what we’ve lost at the workplace we shared and how radical these dynamic changes have been. I didn’t want to look on the bright side (yet).
And that is perhaps why we have chosen to spend our Sunday afternoon in this place. To take a moment to engage with what we have loved and lost, and the feelings that come with that engagement, whether you are mourning the loss of a loved one, a beloved companion animal, a job, a time in your life, or something that you were able to do in the past, you are welcome here to rest. Change is the law of life, and we can use a moment to take in this dynamic state.
One of my loves lost is my mother, whose last Christmas six years ago, was spent in the hospital. My mother experienced a great deal of change in her life. She was the oldest of eight children in an Irish-German Catholic family in Central New York State. Her father ran one of the pharmacies in town, working long hours to provide for the community and his growing family. My mother, born weeks after the end of World War II, had a congenital condition that required her to constantly change her expectations of what her body could do. Her body had a hard time keeping up with her spirit. She started one degree an hour from home, realized it would be dreadfully boring, and moved to a different degree program, in New York City, many hours from home. She lived on crackers with mustard, she told me once, saving her money for her art supplies. Her degree was never finished as she was called home to tend to her younger siblings and run the home when her mother became ill. Yet more change, and more adjustment. She met my father a few years later—he was teaching in the town south of where they lived and I grew up. Soon she was a wife, and then a mother. They raised four children on a teacher’s salary, and her business as a seamstress in the town. All this time, my mother looked for the small joys, the flower poking through the cement sidewalk, the light through the window that shattered into a million rainbows by a prism hanging there. Her favorite meal, she claimed, was one that was made for her. She liked things classic, practical, and not too flashy, When she cooked for herself, it was Spanish Rice. She particularly liked a Christmas cookie that was not one of the classics—a ball of sugar cookie-like dough rolled in sesame seeds.
We flew to see my mother in the hospital that Christmas break. I intended to bake her some cookies but ran out of time, and she was dealing with c. diff, so it’s just as well. I spent a lot of time with her at the hospital. I think she and I both knew that this may be the last time we would be together in this life. She asked me if there was anything we needed to talk through. We had talked through a lot over the years and nearly daily on my way to work, and so I said no, I think we’re good. She didn’t disagree. I hope she did so because she really felt that way and not because she didn’t want to rock the boat. I spent much of my visit with her, We chatted quietly and I stayed while she rested, and I tried to encourage her to take a some horrible hospital food or a little to drink. Knowing what to talk about when you want to talk about everything, and ask all the questions you may ever have, turns out to be exceptionally difficult. I cried as we drove away from the hospital for our flight home. My mother died that May, having never really recovered from the heart attack and fall in November the previous year.
Now I feel most close to my mother now in three situations: when I get out her sewing machine to make or repair some textile, sometimes (but not always) when I am in the kitchen, and when I do the laundry. The last one may sound weird but makes sense to me. She guarded her washing machine carefully: it was one of the lynchpins to a functional household of six people and would cost a lot to repair. She would not let us do the laundry: we could sort or fold, even move the clothes to the dryer or hang them on the line, but the running of the washing machine was for her and her alone. This task, therefore, when I chat with my mother most, especially when a piece of laundry that is hanging to dry to the left of our machine rests its arm on my shoulder as I work. I find it comforting.
These are the times when I think of the questions that I didn’t get a chance to ask. Questions about how or when things happened in my life, or in hers. How she felt about the turns her life took. How to make some sewing project work. What do you do with teenagers? I appreciate these conversations with her over the laundry, but I wish we could have them in person. I imagine that each of you have your own experience with Love and loss.
To leave you with something sweet, I have made a batch of my mother’s sesame cookies. I welcome you to take and enjoy a cookie if you like, and to look for the small joys and sweetness in life.
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