Love and loss, pain and pleasure.

Hey y’all. Sorry it’s been so long since I last updated, but real life reared it’s ugly head and has been spitting and lashing at me with a vengeance.

I know many of you read this blog because I spout off about things that have the tendency of pissing most of us off. But today, today I want to pour out my heart to those of you who read this.

As many of you may know, my Mom passed away in 2000. She had been ill for a long time and she was just too tired and beat down to continue to fight this horrifying thing we call life. She left this world rather gently, she was in ICU and didn’t seem to struggle or fight against the decent of that eternal darkness we call Death. A nurse was with her, as my Dad had just left for work and I was driving up from Grantsville. That nurse later told us that my Mom had turned to her and said, “Do you see them? Do you see the Angels?” Then she took one last breath and was gone.

Why am I bringing this up, you ask. Well, this week some one else that I love went Home with the Angels. Jacqueline Daisy Gumm, the mother of a man that I lived with for years, passed away on Tuesday, July 5. She was 79 years old.

I met Jackie not long after my own Mother had passed away. And, although she may never have realized it, she took a place in my heart right next to my own Mom. She and I didn’t always get along, sometimes we didn’t speak, but that is the way it had been with my own Mother as well.

Jackie made the most delicious cinnamon rolls. She could bake anything and it would turn out wonderfully. Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter dinners at her house should have been listed as one of the Wonders of the World. The food was always graciously prepared and the atmosphere was warm and loving.

I would sit with Jackie on the back porch and talk of things both trivial and of the utmost importance. She could make me laugh with stories about her children, her childhood and her own Mother. Jackie had seen and experienced things that most of us only read about in books or experience through movies. She was and always will be one of the most interesting people I have ever met.

She raised 5 children that all grew to be wonderful human beings. John is the oldest and the only boy, so growing up with 4 sisters was something that he had to endure, although I know he loves each and every one of them. She was a wonderful mother and doted on her children and grandchildren. I know that each of them are suffering a pain that no one can understand unless that person has lost their own Mother.

Now, you may be wondering why I’m writing all of this. Why is the death of someone who was no longer in my life to the extent that they had once been is so important. It’s simple actually. I love her. She stepped in and took the place of a woman, my own Mother, whom I had never really gotten the chance to know.

Jackie eased some of the pain of losing my own Mom.

There is no way that what I’m experiencing can compare with the pain and suffering her own family is experiencing. I in no way believe that my hurt can ever compare to theirs.

But with the passing of this wonderful lady, many things that I had thought were dealt with have resurfaced. The guilt at not having a better relationship with my own Mother is eating at me with the vicious intensity of a ravenous dog. The pain of never understanding the reasons behind so many of the things that had taken place in my childhood is causing me to imagine the worse possible scenarios, and has always caused me to have a poor self-image. The steel hardened truth of never hearing my Mother’s voice again is turning my heart into tiny pieces of confetti that with every breath scatters and blows farther away.

I am trying to process my own pain, my own confusion and my own regrets. I’m not doing such a good job, but I will get through it. Someday.

In the meantime, I sit here and picture my Mom talking and laughing with her own parents, with her beloved brother that was taken from us too soon and with my own Grandson who was snatched from life before he ever had the chance to experience it. In my mind, they are all sitting under a blooming crabapple tree on a blanket made by the Hand of God, talking, laughing and basking in the love of one another and the Everlasting Love Of God.

And sitting hand in hand just a little ways away is Jackie and her wonderful husband, Mutt. They are talking and laughing and are so happy to be together again. They, too, are basking in love and the Glorious Peace of God.

In my mind, I see all the loved ones that I miss so terrible much. Each of them are healthy and whole. Christian is playing with his toys, something he never grew to be old enough to do here on Earth. Taco is playing music, his addictions and pain forever gone. Dave is sitting under a tree, strumming a mandolin, his limbs once again strong and sure, his pain gone forever. Crettie is laughing and telling jokes, her eyes bright and her breathing easy, her smile gloriously beautiful. And my old buddy Johnny, well, Johnny is just relaxing, the pain and trouble of life here on Earth a long forgotten memory.

I think of all of those whom I love that have gone on before me and I am envious.

Dodadaghovi.