This is my tenth Mother’s Day without my mom here on Earth.  I am going to spend it in much the same way I spent the first, going with family members to the town where mom and dad became high school sweethearts and married 60 years ago, the town all four grandparents lived in until they died, and the town where my mother is buried.

Re-reading the words I’ve just written, it sounds like a sad and morbid day, but it will not be.  I will be with those I love, including my dad, celebrating and remembering mom.  I feel close to mom in many different places and ways, but I think my dad feels closest to her when he goes to the town where they were young sweethearts, going on movie dates, eating ice cream at the local shop, and dreaming about the life they would build together.

Theirs is a Hollywood love story:  Small town high school and a pretty girl, no one has ever seen before, walks into class on the first day of school and sits down in the only empty seat in the room.  The blonde boy behind her leans up and says with a twinkle in his eye, “I didn’t know they let Freshman into Junior English.”  The girl replies curtly, “They don’t.”  That evening the girl tells her mother, “I met the sassiest boy in the entire school today.”  In her wisdom, my grandmother says, “Don’t be quick to judge, that boy may turn out to be someone important in your life.”  Cue the music and begin to tell the story of the two soul mates whom God brought together that September day.

No, it will not be a sad day.  It will be one where I will listen with the open heart of a loving daughter to all my daddy has to say about his love for my mother and the wonderful 55 years they had together here on Earth.  I will listen hard and try to capture for future generations all he has to share.  Mom and Dad were separated by death 10 years ago, but his love for her never waned.  Someday, sooner rather than later, they will be reunited together in Heaven to continue their love story.