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A few months ago, my mother-in-law, Sweet Eileen, passed away. As was her wont in such matters, there was no memorial service, no funeral, no words to be solemnly bespoken – the very idea of which would have made her laugh at the thought that such nonsense would ever be considered.
So I thought I would say my few words here. She was not a DUer, so I’m hoping she won’t read this from wherever she is – and yet I know that she’ll know, and she will forgive me just the same.
Sweet Eileen came into my life fifteen years ago, when my husband brought me home to meet the family. What too often turns out to be the beginning of the traditional battle between two women who love, each in their own way, the same man, turned out for Eileen and I to be the beginning of a friendship that transcended all else. She was, and still is, my best friend.
She is still so close to me, I can smell her perfume even now; I can feel her thumb rubbing against my cheek, the way it always did when she’d kissed me hello or goodbye and furiously tried to remove her tell-tale lipstick from my face.
She hears me when I say what I would give to have her company for one more minute, one more hour, one more day – and she knows that in my selfishness, only a lifetime of her company would suffice.
I remember her laughter – our laughter – when we were caught giggling, like schoolgirls, behind cupped hands – assuming the vacant stare position as we responded to the inevitable question ”What are you two talking about?”
“Nuthin’,” we would say – because that’s what girlfriends say, that’s what girlfriends do.
We shared a love of Russian history, Celtic music, Victorian antiques – books, movies, newspaper articles, politics – and a sense of the world that surrounded us, both the physical and what might lay beyond.
We loved the same man, as son and as husband, and never saw the two as being mutually exclusive, or as a winner-take-all battle that had to be fought, no less won.
My Sweet Eileen had a capacity to understand and empathize with others that still serves as a guideline for the way I live my life; that still shines as a beacon when I am tossed on rocky, unfamiliar shores.
My Sweet Eileen is still the light of my life, a light that will never be dimmed by her passing from this earth, or by the passage of time.
My Sweet Eileen wraps her arms around me in my darkest hours, and reminds me of the light that is straight ahead – she reminds me that we will find each other again in the fullness of time, in a place where our laughter will know no bounds.
No response to this thread is necessary nor expected. I just needed to say what I’ve said, and I had no doubt that this was the place I would be welcome to say it.
Thanks for listening.
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