Inheritance

Mom has been gone 2 years now. Seems impossible, but it's true. And I guess Memorial Day makes you think of people you've lost, so I've been remembering My folks and Russ' Mom who I loved dearly.

There was no big inheritance when Mom passed. Her little house wasn't worth a lot of money. It's sale didn't buy me a Mercedes. It paid some bills, made gifts to kids, socked a little away. Done. She died believing we would be set for life from her bequests. We let her believe it.

But I inherited other things that turn out to be priceless. A metal ice cream scoop with a knobby handle that outperforms all of my WIlliams/Sonoma fancy-dancy scoops. A huge wooden butcher block that she made pasta on every Sunday morning and then, as she got older,  just on special occasions.  It serves as the surface of my stainless work table. A recipe book with notations on the inside covers. A green vase I bought for her at an antique shop when I was newly married and thinking myself sophisticated. The white plastic beaded earrings, impossible to describe, that she wore on all special days. So much a part of her, that I clipped one to my bag when my son got married. I felt she was there.

A pair of knitted slipper socks with outrageous felt flowers that I hide in the bottom drawer but pull out on stormy Winter nights. Some paintings that were on her walls so long they left light rectangles on the wall when we took them down. (Mom was a smoker).

Every day I touch things that were a part of her, a part of our lives growing up. I sense her smile when I pull on the ugly socks. She always believed being cold gave you a cold. "Put on a hat!"

Today I listened to the last voice mail she left. I do that every so often. Hear her voice. But she is closest to me when I scoop out some ice cream or run a sponge over the worn wooden block on my work table.