Women Who Inspire

November 26th. It was an unusually rainy night, and an unsettling feeling took root in my gut. I was excited about the upgrade to my hotel room from run of the mill single to suite...and seemingly for no reason, something told me you had something to do with it. When I opened the double doors to suite, I barely had time to pore over the room’s details. A neon sign hung from the wall on the right hand side, that said “be happy,” a quick glance to the left and there was a spray bottle on the floor, almost as if someone had just left the room. I quickly glanced around, eyes darting one hundred eighty degrees, flicked on the intense light in the bathroom, no one.

With the surety that I was alone, I plopped down on the grey linen chair in front of the desk and suddenly let out a sigh. I was exhausted from all the travel and almost violently, ernh, ernh ernh the phone danced across the table vibrating. It was the hospice calling. I hadn ‘t saved the number but I recognized the first six of them, seven-one-three...My heart sank, I thought if I didn’t answer then it couldn’t be true. Not even five seconds later another forceful ring, ernh...ernh...ernh! as if someone on the other line was calling to tell me someone died. My stomach began to churn, part fear, part hunger. I cried myself to sleep that night, after begging you to show yourself to me, I wouldn’t rest until you told me you were safe, that you were happy. Shaking my head out of disbelief and relief, I knew you were. I woke up the next morning wrapped in a towel I dried off with the night before, eyes barely open, swollen damn near shut from all the crying. It was real, you were gone. The tears poured hot down my face.

Not even a week passed, you sat straight up in bed it was six a.m. in the hospice where I had stayed with you the night before, you were frantically trying to get up moaning “I gotta get to work, I gotta get to work.” Some say the dying are not picturing the end but replaying the journey-on their way to yet another voyage. Maybe that’s how you felt most of your life, always having to be somewhere for someone else. That’s why you inspired me the most. Not because of cookies you baked or stockings you hung on Christmas, but because you saved me, with your love. An infant who recognized your embrace as the first one that would never let me go-and you haven’t. The way you smelled, the way you dressed, the way you carried yourself, the way you loved your family, with force even when they didn’t deserve your grace, you gave it freely. Constantly sacrificing, like many women of your generation, ignoring physical health, and having very little vocabulary for mental health, you sacrificed even in death.

Your ascent beyond the three-dimensional realm has given you infinite access to fulfill dreams you couldn’t on this side of life, for whatever reason, largely in part because you were always doing for everyone but you. I’d like to think, no I’m certain that as an ancestor you participate in a cosmic orchestra, that you lean into your nurturing ways even more but with omniscient eyes. Your greatest inspiration to me has been your transition, you are the grandest mother now, because you can love and exhibit love to me in ways of spirit. In ways that human hands cannot touch. I love you Barbara Jean.