
To mom on New Years day 2010
This
is meant as a little tribute to you mom. We understand that you have gone
over one of the harder bumps on the road of life these last couple of
years, but as we all knew you would, you have done it with all dignity
and honor. We admire how you have accepted the
period penned at the end of the previous chapter of your life, and how
bravely you now have written the captions of this present chapter. We are
glad for how
you so beautifully fill the pages of each day in this chapter with beauty
and happiness. This is a beauty and happiness that we have the privelage
of sharing with you.
However there have never been periods written in your capacity of mother
to us … I have 63 years of experience of this – and I am glad for every
one of them – latest but not least these last ten years. With small
children, mothers are often confronted with the challenge of understanding
and caring for their loved ones in situations where solutions are out of
range. The bully down the street .. the painful bruises of a stubbed toe
or injured dignity, the lost things that won’t be found etc. The
miracle of a mothers lullaby is not in solving these issues .. but simply
in changing focus so that a new day will find fresh and new roads to
happiness and fulfillment regardless these imperfections in the
environment around us..
I have
tried to pass this on to my children. When Emma graduated from nurses
training a few years ago, I wrote a little note to her and said “In your
school you have learned all the most modern and scientific principles to
enable you to make a difference for the folks you care for – wonderful
things… apply them with all your heart, but your own fulfillment and the
greatest challenge of your future is likely more dependent on how you
honorably learn to deal with the faults and flaws in the people, systems
and policies that you work and live with. Regard this as a challenge
rather than as an obstacle in your way. Find a way to live and happily
work inspite of the defects and flaws in people and systems that will
not change. This does not mean acceptance of what is wrong -- but
entails the wisdom of retaining integrity and courage, as one does
their best to navigate around the idiotic and the unreasonable in
the world that is ours to live in.
I have
taken a litte clip from a well known song, that to me, describes at least a
little bit of what you are and have been to me as a mom. Hope you understand what I mean.

On your side (Simon And Garfunkel)
Edgar
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