A Forgotten Letter

Here she is again, the lovely Marina-of-the-B-Line, our guest blogger. This piece is borrowed from her Ramblog on Facebook "Notes."

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This year I lost both my parents and, as expected, I ramble a lot about them and about death. I do not necessarily share all these ramblings with you for I do not want to sadden you. The following story though may start as a sad one but as you will see, it has a happy ending.

When my sister Silvana told me Mom needed to have surgery, I booked a seat on the first plane to Paris. I knew I would be too late to comfort her before the operation but I would be there when she would wake up and as long as she knew that, it was all right. Unfortunately Mom never woke up.
The guilt I felt for not being there by her side made my mother’s death more difficult to accept. The death of a loved one is never an easy thing to accept but when guilt is part of the equation, it becomes insurmountable. I still had so many things to say to her and now it was too late. So I thought.

A few days after the funeral, Silvana and I sorted out our mother’s personal documents. I found about two dozen letters and notes that Mom had kept. She, unlike Dad, did not keep very much at all. Those were the announcements of my and Silvana’s births, of our children's births, a poem a friend had written for my parents’ 50th anniversary, a note written by Dad… Mom had saved in an envelope her dearest memories.

I then unfolded a letter and was surprised to recognize my own writing. It was a letter I had written at least 25 years earlier! So long ago, I had forgotten about it! In this letter, I thanked my parents for all the love they had given me and told them their love had made me a better person; it was some of that love I would share with my children, I wrote.

My mother, a woman who did not keep anything, had kept my letter! She already knew the very same words I thought I would never have a chance to say to her! Even if I had not written the letter, she would still have known all the love I had for her but the fact she had kept it for all those years showed how touched she had been by my letter and how happy it had made her feel.

I was sure she had read it many times. She might even have thought of it before the surgery, just in case something would go wrong. It was not as good as having me on her side and telling her “See you in a few hours Mom” but I was also certain it still brought her comfort.

My letter had brought her the same comfort it had brought me when I discovered it among her favorite memories. The comfort I needed to accept my mother's death.