Angel Wings..

I try to keep her ashes close by. I almost feel like this is what’s bridging the connection between us and the Other Side.

The words my uncle wrote on the napkin that night still float through my mind. Hearing her say that she is proud of me gets me through. When she had passed I wasn’t able to say goodbye to her, I wasn’t able to hear her voice, I wasn’t able to look into her eyes and tell her how much I loved her.

July 2005

It was just another summer day and I was with my uncle in his truck. We wanted to just take a drive as we both were having a hard day dealing with my mother’s loss. As we came up on a light, my uncle turned and whispered “Your mother is here”. I looked up hoping to see her but sadly, I could not. I looked towards my uncle and he had the biggest smile on his face. He said in awe “She has the most beautiful wings I have ever seen”. I chuckled and asked him what he meant. He said “Your mother is happy, she finally got her wings and they are beautiful. All she can talk about are her angel wings”. I immediately cheered up and could visualize her beautiful smile. Knowing my mother was happy made me happy.

I still get sad every day not having her here in the physical form but spiritually she’s very comforting. She visits me but the only thing I am able to see or hear are the footsteps through the kitchen, when she’s playing with the dog, when I open my eyes at night and see balls of light hovering around me, or when she whispers my name at the top of the staircase. Even though I cannot hear or see her, I just think back to the night of her return. My uncle is the only one in the family who has the ability to see and talk to her.  

But nevertheless, she has returned to me..

The Spirit in the Room

I always knew my mother was going to pass away, but it was just a matter of when that I wasn't sure about.
After my mother got sick, we often had conversations of what life would be like without her.
And even though she tried to prepare us, I still was scared to lose her.
So in her last days I made her promise me one thing, and that one thing was for her to come back and visit me…

May 2004

It was summer and my mother had passed 4 months prior. My father sent both my sister and I to my uncle's house as he needed time to grieve. We all were having a difficult time coping with her death.
The night my sister and I arrived, we had a family dinner to share personal stories of my mother. There was still a sadness lurking in the air but we all managed to laugh at a few of the funny things she used to do.
After the laughter stopped, I tried to hold back my tears but could not stop them from flowing down my face.  As I grabbed my napkin to wipe my eyes I felt a tingling on my neck as if something had just brushed by me. I looked up, trying not to feel frightened and noticed my uncle across the room. He had this look in his eyes like he was staring at something behind me. He quickly grabbed a napkin and started writing. I called out his name, “Uncle Luke?”… but no response. After a few minutes of watching him frantically continue to write, he suddenly stopped. He told me to pull the chair out beside me. So confusingly, I grabbed the chair and pulled it out. He laughed and said “Say hi to your mother, she has something to tell you” and started to read from the napkin. Every word that he read was exactly as if it was coming directly from her.

My heart dropped, and it was in that moment I knew she had returned to me…