Cleaning

When I had my own apartment in California, I had a friend over one time and her comment surprised me. "Shelby, your apartment is like a model home, do you really live here?" To me this was such a compliment. I like it neat, organized and simply decorated. Before I left on vacation, I always cleaned the house and put new sheets on the bed, so upon my return I would have a perfectly clean house. Maybe slightly compulsive, but none of my roommates or family would ever complain that I didn't clean. I am sure that this is one quality that I was taught by my mother.

And although our house has always been neat and well kept, Mom has been here close to 22 years. I realized that, when I moved home last November, there was lots of "stuff" neatly tucked away. Thankfully, Naomi shares an organizational trait with me. We have been working our way through, bit-by-bit, and discovering many treasures. In Mom's closet she had boxes labeled by year. I found some of my first drawings - a face, a house and a pink elephant and also many old pictures, pictures of our perfect family. We had birthday celebrations, Christmas day photos and dress up with friends' pictures. It is so precious to be reminded of times when we were a family, when everything was as it should be.

One precious treasure were books that Mom had made Dad for an anniversary before Jeremy or I were born. They detailed all of the reasons that Mom was in love with her husband. And then as we continued our hunt, we found countless cards celebrating birthdays, anniversaries, Mother's & Father's Days and "just because" days some from Mom to Dad and others from Dad to Mom. Their love never faded. I am convinced that they loved each other more after 32 years of marriage, than they had ever before.

What an inspiration to be the result of that love and get to experience it on a daily basis.

It has not been easy going through these memories. I think it is especially hard for Mom. I wish I could ask her about pictures and stories and things that she remembers. It's not fair that I haven't heard my Mother's voice for almost 9 months.

One last thing that we have as a new treasure of old is a quilt. It is sure to be an heirloom. I had saved all of Dad's old t-shirts from marathons he ran. Then my idea was that Mom could make them into a quilt. During this next cleaning, I came upon them again. As Mom's birthday approached. I thought this would be a perfect gift for her. She is losing weight and gets cold easily so my amazing Grandmother put it together in no time. It is amazing and Mom loves watching movies with her new quilt.