Entry for 22 July 2012:
On 22 June 2012, one month ago, my mother Ann Helena Kearney
Elliott died of complications from brain cancer in Paso Robles, California, at
the age of 83. Today I’m marking the one
month’s mind of her passing. I spent the
last seven weeks of her life with various combinations of my siblings, helping
care for her. It was a powerful experience,
which has left me in a different place psychologically, contemplating what it
means for her to be no longer physically present in my life, and what my
priorities are this point going forward.
If you are interested in learning more about her, my
siblings and I have posted an obituary/account of her life online at: http://www.murraycreek.net/ann_k_elliott.html
.
In addition, during her illness, I kept a journal/poem
sequence documenting the journey we traveled with her. At more than 80 pages,
it’s too long to post on this blog and is currently only available as a Google
document at: http://murraycreek.net/robert/conversations_mom.html .
(For best results, you may want to download it.)
Here are the two sections that I used for my talk in
Antwerp, the opening section and a later one:
0.
Saturday Afternoon, 4 May: Arrival
I arrive, full of grand
ideas
about the deep and needed
conversations we’ll have.
But I find you past all
that,
With your right brain
In charge of what you say.
Instead, we converse in
catch phrases.
Surprisingly, these reveal
Deep and zen-like richness.
11. Thursday 17 May: Follow the Leader
Perplexed and
confused,
By the many
twists and turns
In this story,
We have given up
trying to know
What will happen
next
On this journey
of yours.
When you were
still mobile, every hour or so,
You’d get up from
your chair or bed,
Without saying or
sometimes even without knowing
Where you were
going to go.
“Where are you going?”
I asked one day.
“Follow the
leader,” you said.
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