Five years
It’s a chilly July morning (FINALLY!) and I’m wrapped in my mom’s napping afghan. It feels like a hug. My last actual Mom-hug happened in June 2018. Five years ago. On an unknown date in late July 2018, we talked for the last time. It was one or two days after my son had had a significant surgical procedure. “How’s our patient?” she wanted to know. I was happy to update her but quickly felt anxious to get back to him and ended the call. Soon after that conversation, she was back in the hospital. She’d been there in April and—I had forgotten this until just now when I read through my old emails—earlier in July. COPD, pneumonia, UTIs, she was not well. Still, the sudden decline surprised us. She wasn’t with it enough to talk to me on the phone. I left for Harrisburg early on Tuesday morning, July 31, after being informed on Sunday that this likely was the end. The 400-mile drive gave me (too much) time to imagine various bedside scenarios. I figured my sister and I would