Picture

Man a year sure flies fast.

Looking at it (the picture), I can feel the slightly rough but very comforting texture of the white cotton thermal blanket that covered the disgusting black couch that was left in her house in Pennsylvania when she first bought it.--It was our house. But it was her house. She loved it so much...being there is like breathing her in because she put everything into it. Now; well, now it's my house.--There's a giant black pillow behind her. Curled up like a princess-dragon, Softy smiles out at me from the corner of the couch, her green eyes glowing with the flash of the camera. I know what it's like to rest my head on her soft furry body, like she's a pillow, the way Momma (wow, it really hurts to write that word; I don't know if it has to do with the fact that "For Good" and "Defying Gravity" have been blasting into my heart for the past 15 minutes) is laying. Her light gray turtleneck, which is scrunched up all over but still fits her healthy body well, allows me to make the mental note that it must be winter. Momma's salt-n-pepper hair sort of blends in with Softy's at its darkest. Both of them are smiling back at me with the most contented, pleasant smiles I can possibly remember ever having witnessed. Her face looks soft, full, and clear, and her eyes, though not unusually large or particularly magestic, bare into mine and make me feel so happy.

Listening to "Defying Gravity" in the context of my mother is...different. Incredible, and so empowering. She really did, didn't she? She trusted her instincts, lept, and seemingly was through accepting limits 'cause someone else they were so. I just knew her as this...perfect, intelligent, incredibly powerful and amazing woman...Momma. But there's an entire past there, that I never really got a grasp on. I'm not sure I want to. She was too proud, and, as I see it, had every right to be. I don't mean to idealize her, or idolize her, but I suppose that's the general thought pattern I've got going here right now.

I used to have a message she left me on my voicemail. Her "Oochkie BahBah Boochkie" thing. I believe it said something like "Oochkie bahbah boochkie, Momma call daughter, daughter no answer. Daughter call when she has time. Momma love daughter." The one I ended up saving was her explaination of why she couldn't come to parent's weeekend; the other one got deleted by accident.

There's no point to this really; no moral or anything. And I've run out of time. But I suppose the point is that in 10 months this is the first time I can really write about it or share it with people. Of course, it still makes very little direct mention of emotion, compared to what I used to write, but it's the first step.

Much Love,
~Shmolly