A Word to the Lady in Walmart About Her Mama

 

The wheelchair was rolling slowly down the cosmetic aisle as the pretty older lady looked at the vast array of colorful lipsticks, blushes and eyeliners.  Touching each item gently and carefully, reading ingredients and creative color names, her lips moved as her eyes darted between Maybelline and L’Oréal.

I may not have noticed her as I made my quick dash into Walmart to pick up a couple of items, but I could not help but notice the woman, a younger version of the lady in the chair, standing with arms crossed in frustration at the end of the aisle.

Obviously, mother and daughter.  Both with blue eyes and soft blond hair – one tall with deep blue eyes the color of ocean water and perfectly styled blond waves. Mother sat straight backed in her wheelchair, pale eyes avoiding the stare of her daughter while her fingers brushed though her blond/gray permed curls.

“What are you doing now?” asked the younger version of the wheelchair bound lady.  “I hate it when you roll away from me and I cannot find you.” 

“I’m just looking,” the elder lady said without glancing up from the tube of red lipstick.  “Just looking.”

The hurried daughter shrugged, grabbed hold of the wheelchair and steered her mother away from the beauty department.  Just as she passed, she looked at me and rolled her eyes.

Mothers! Her eyes clearly conveyed.  What do ya do?

There was so much I wanted to tell her.  So much she needed to know.

I wanted to tell her to let her mother “just look” as long as her heart desired.  There will come a time when you would give anything to take your mama to Walmart – just to look around.

I wanted to tell her to listen to her mama when she is talking about things that seem silly or inappropriate or things that she doesn’t think really matter.

Every. Single. Word. Matters.

I would have told her that those few minutes shopping with her mama will become some of the best memories she will ever have.

I want her to know that someday her heart will break into a million pieces – and it will feel like she is walking around with all the extraordinarily heavy shards of it piled onto her thin shoulders. The grief will be almost too heavy to bear.

There will be days she will feel like a ghost of herself, not quite present but visible.

She will someday pull into that Walmart parking lot, sit and cry for a while and go back home, not even remembering what she came to buy.

She needs to know that the big memories – holidays, celebrations, family events - these are not the ones that will break your heart over and over again.  It’s the small memories of everyday life with your mama that will sneak up on you and punch holes in your soul.

She will look at pictures of herself BEFORE and see a different person. One that she will never be again.

Nothing will ever be as funny, exciting, sad, or right. Everything will be BEFORE and AFTER.

Your mama, I wanted to tell her, is the only person that you have spent your whole life plus 9 months with.  She is the only person who knows you better than you know yourself – and loves you anyway.  Endlessly.  Unconditionally.  

Loving your mama is both breathtaking and devastating. A mother-daughter relationship is beautiful and complicated; difficult and seamless; frustrating and affirming.  

Losing her changes your life profoundly.

Even though she is gone forever, your heart will continue to search for her.  In crowds, in old pictures, in her thousands of keepsakes, cards and letters. Eventually you will find her again, in the laughter of your children, in family traditions, in your own reflection.

This lady really needs to know that losing her mama will change her life in so many gut wrenching ways; yet, in this deep well of grief and sorrow she will find who she was always meant to be. 

Her mama’s daughter.

If I could go back, I would grab the pretty lady’s arm, pull her close and whisper to her, “You don’t know yet, but someday you will understand that you will never have a relationship with anyone in this world like the one you have with your mama.  Cherish every single eye-rolling second.”

Instead, I go back to my car forgetting what I went to buy, and I cry.

I cry big hot tears and then I go home.