A week ago Sunday morning, I sat down to participate in a Zoom meeting of the Bozeman Dharma Center’s Insight Meditation group. The guest speaker was Dawn Scott, a woman who I knew nothing about except her status as an alumni of Spirit Rock Meditation Center in California, and an ongoing instructor with a group called Inward Bound Mindfulness Education (iBme, https://ibme.com/about/). I’d never heard of that organization before (I learned about it while reading Dawn’s bio) but immediately upon reading it’s name, I remembered a conversation some 11 years ago, in which I was asked what I would do if I could do anything in the world, unlimited by any constraint. I replied, without holding back, that I would want to be part of an organization that takes young girls into the woods, with an emphasis on helping them to embrace nature, and themselves.

As I launched Zoom, I was pleasantly surprised to see so many faces, 25 or more, smiling back at me. Sitting down in my chair and turning my computer’s camera on, as I glanced out my window to relish the sunshine, I heard someone welcome me by name. I recognized, and paused to savor, the feeling of being welcomed as I unmuted my computer, and expressed how good it was to see everyone. Settled into my seat I could see, centered at the top of my screen surrounded by so many white faces, one woman of color. After being introduced, and thanking us sincerely for the invitation, Dawn Scott began by saying “I got a text the other day from my mom.” I felt my breath catch in my chest, a familiar constriction start to form in my throat.

Meditation is, for me and many others, a means to practice sitting still, and greet whatever arises with acceptance, curiosity and kindness, instead of judgement, clinging, or seeking some sort of distraction. As meditation teacher Pema Chodron says, “Sounds simple. Is not.” But after years of working at it, I have come to trust meditation as the single greatest gift that I can give myself, and (because of it’s effects on my well-being) my relationships with others. It was through meditation, for instance, that I first began learning how to recognize when I was distracted or upset, and pause, take a breath, and start again. This practice has become my anchor in the darkest of hours, as well as life’s most precious moments.

But my reaction to Dawn’s mention of her mother still caught me off guard. Tears welling up, gently rolling down my cheeks, I recognized the now-familiar emotion of grief, and reflexively looked at the photograph of my mom across the room from me. There would be no more texts, or phone calls, from her. Not any more. 

As she continued, Dawn told us that her mom’s message said, simply, “I’m so tired of this pandemic.” Dawn paused for a moment, allowing the simple truth of these words to resonate with her audience. She then resumed, acknowledging our collective fear, exhaustion, anger and grief as we face not only the pandemic, and all of its associated losses, but also the climate crisis, the increasing social and political tensions in our country. As Dawn continued speaking, I noticed myself at times embarrassed, tempted to hide my tears by turning off my camera, other times longing for someone to see and acknowledge my pain, then slowly opening enough to recognize our collective sorrow, and exhaustion, as I examined the faces of the other participants on the call. And so, yet again, I was tenderly reminded that I am not the only one grieving in our troubled world. As I continued to sit, listening and looking at Dawn and the other participants, being with them all, I felt my emotions give way to a deep feeling of gratitude – for the ability to be with this community of people who share a commitment to learn how to sit with whatever arises, resisting the temptation to cling to it, or run from it – and instead, let it be.

January 25, 2022, represents the one year anniversary of my mom’s death. As this date approaches, I have found myself increasingly motivated to capture some thoughts to help me give meaning to her life, and the journey – for me and countless others who loved her – of letting her go. Some lessons to hold on and return to, that transcend the longing. This desire grew stronger when I found myself on the phone with a friend two weeks ago, who told me about his mother’s passing last June, after a 10 year battle with cancer. His voice breaking, he acknowledged that he is still in the grip of grief, and asked me for any words of wisdom. When I think back on our conversation I’m embarrassed to say that I probably rattled on too long about my own experience at the expense of inviting him to share more about his own. But as I spoke, I found myself telling him what I have come to trust about my own journey, namely that my grief is giving birth to a deep appreciation, I would even say the beginnings of joy, for this precious life that my mother gave to me. And along with that comes a fierce determination to live it fully, now. Now. NOW.

I remember telling my friend what other wise, caring souls told me: mothers are hard to lose. You and she shared a body once. Her body was literally your first home. And yet, as we emerge from her womb and venture forth into the world, our mothers also often become our first enemies. And perhaps that is the ultimate explanation why mothers seem to know us like no one does, or can – why we remain connected by a thread that extends beyond words. My friend’s voice broke as he acknowledged this truth in his own life. After a bit, I shared with him my conviction that the best way to honor my mom is to learn to love myself like she did, like she would want me to be loved, while growing beyond the limits of all that she could and did not provide, because of her own limitations. Limitations which, for a very long time, I completely mistook for my own.

I’m not sure if I told my friend about sitting at my mom’s bedside at what proved to be her final hours, beseeching her to hand over whatever it was that was preventing her from leaving, to just give it to me, and trust that her work with it was finished, that now it was my turn.  Almost immediately after I stopped pleading, three words came to me, clearer than any guidance I can recall in my life thus far: Just be you. 

Coming as it did in the midst of this pandemic, which has taken so much from all of us, alongside of the hastening climate crisis and increasing polarization and division on every societal and economic level, my mom’s illness and passing gave me something to focus on, something to anchor around – although I couldn’t always see it clearly at the time. But now, looking back, I can clearly see how all of the people who came together to support her through her dementia, determined to help her come hell or high water, became a community unto her, and to each other – a community held together by the art, and the practices, of kindness, love, patience, forgiveness, and grace.

There was my father, mom’s primary caregiver for more than 5 years, ultimately sequestered at home with her in the final two years of her disease, his best friend dying of COVID at the very moment that he was coming to terms with the need to move his wife of 51 years to memory care. Even as he was struggling to remember to take his own medications, dad dutifully administered hers, keeping mom safe at home, patiently answering the same questions a thousand times a day, watching Hallmark movies and the Sound of Music with her night after night. There were the countless caregivers – and two in particular, Mimi and Debbie – that miraculously kept showing up at our door, even through the pandemic, selflessly offering their laughter, companionship, patience, tenderness, faith, and grace. There were my parents’ neighbors in their retirement community, many of whom had walked the path of dementia with their former spouses, who, by simply sharing their own stories, and listening to ours, helped us to allow ourselves to grieve as we kept putting one foot in front of the other, remembering to breathe. There were the geriatric physicians and nurse practitioners that we first consulted six years ago, who remained with us until her death, steadfastly guiding us through the unknown and scary territory of Alzheimer’s disease. There were the memory care and hospice staff, who painted mom’s fingernails with iridescent silver polish in the days before she died, and were there kneeling beside her bed, gently stroking her hand and quietly whispering her name, when I arrived after her final fall. There was the clergy of my parents’ church – St. Peter’s Episcopal – whose sermons lifted our spirits and helped us keep going as mom slipped further and further away, and threatened to take our sanity and strength with her. Father Furman Buchanan, and Assistant Priest Marie Cope, visited my dad during various, separate stays in the hospital as well as a rehabilitation unit; they also showed up on my parent’s front steps, masked and standing at a distance, to personally bless my parents, and our entire family, just days before my mom’s brother and I were to put her on a plane with us to Montana, where I would admit her into memory care. And then, there was our extended family, which, time and time again, rose up to hold our hands, and hers, as her disorientation grew progressively more intense, and dad’s endurance grew more and more thin.

As mom’s memory of everyone, including ultimately my sister and me, and then my Dad, began to falter, her two surviving siblings stepped forward, seemingly guided instinctively by the knowledge that they were the last two remaining people on this earth that mom seemed to know. Witnessing the grace and devotion with which my aunt and uncle repeatedly enveloped their sister in a cocoon of safety is something I will never forget. Time after time, through simple gestures such as hosting her for weekly pedicures and showing up on my parents’ doorstep with pizza, wine, and stories from her youth, my Aunt Annie and Uncle Buddy sought to shelter my mom from the storm that was engulfing her, and my dad – setting aside a lifetime of misunderstandings and sibling conflicts for the sole purpose of ensuring that their sister did not feel quite so scared, confused, and alone.

Such was the case in late September, 2020, when my Aunt Annie hosted a small gathering to celebrate mom’s 81st birthday. When my parents arrived on Ann’s doorstep, my Aunt recognized immediately that something wasn’t right, with both of my parents. My mother was angry, glaring at my father, whereas he, usually a jovial social butterfly, was visibly shaken, exhausted, withdrawn. Ann and Shirley quickly swept my mother away to Ann’s bedroom, working to redirect and soothe her, while my dad took a seat on the couch next to Ann’s son, my cousin, Andy. Gradually a picture emerged: on the drive over, my mom had interrogated my dad about where they were going, and who would be there. In her constant barrage of questions, mom repeatedly asked whether her younger sister, Sue, would be present – not remembering that Sue had died, five years prior. Knowing from experience that being honest about Sue’s passing would only anger her, Dad did his best to avoid the truth, telling her that Sue was not able to come – but mom was relentless in needing to know Sue’s whereabouts. Ultimately, exhausted and unable to improvise further, my dad (for the thousandth time since Sue’s death), again attempted to quietly, tenderly inform mom that her sister, and best friend, had died. As they pulled up to Ann’s house, Mom flew into a rage, accusing dad of keeping this information from her, of lying to her about this important fact, and who knows what else. Some five years into her dementia, and six months into the pandemic which meant being sequestered at home virtually alone with a spouse that often did not recognize and was often angry and fearful toward him, dad was rapidly letting go of the pretense that everything was fine. Rather than remaining in the car until things calmed down, he walked mom to the door, allowing her siblings to see her as he often did, silently pleading for their help. As Ann and Shirley worked to calm mom down in Ann’s bedroom, dad sat next to my cousin Andy on the couch, pretending to watch football, tears silently rolling down his cheeks. As Andy sought to console him, dad said simply, voice breaking, “It’s just so hard.” Andy later told me, heartbroken for us all, that he had never seen my dad cry before.

I know no better way to epitomize the selfless acts that transcended all of our family’s differences than the story of my mom’s brother, my Uncle Buddy, who did not hesitate in offering to drop everything, and get on a plane with me and my mom in early January of last year, when I called him to tell him that it was time to move her to memory care, in Montana. This was still before most of the population, certainly any of us, had access to vaccines; mom’s dementia was simply not waiting for that. But my uncle, with whom it is fair to say I share many differences on matters of social, political, economic justice, did not hesitate to sit beside his sister and me for the duration of our cross-country flight, wearing his mask, the two of us working constantly, and desperately, to keep her in her seat as her protests became more urgent and willful, as she repeatedly demanded (and attempted) to get off the plane. When we arrived in the skies over Bozeman six hours later, only to then be re-routed to Salt Lake City due to fog, the other nearby passengers (who had patiently tolerated our party for the duration of the flight) tenderly encouraged us to get a hotel room and try again tomorrow. But my uncle looked at me, and said simply: “Whatever you want to do, baby. We will do whatever you think we need to do.” So, knowing that I would never be able to convince mom to get on a plane again, knowing I needed to end the overstimulation of forcing her to be confined in noisy, cramped spaces with so many strangers as soon as I could, my uncle and I rented a car upon landing in Salt Lake City, and drove with her well into the frigid January night. We arrived in Bozeman, Montana well past midnight, where JD met us in the garage and, setting aside his own fears about COVID, donned his N95 mask to give me a hug before helping me to carry my heavily-sedated but not sleeping mother into the house, down the hall, and into our bedroom. There, she and I would spend four fitful nights awaiting a COVID test and her admittance into memory care. Two weeks later, she was gone.

Our family has dozens, likely hundreds, of similar stories from our journey with mom through dementia – people setting aside differences, fighting against their own fear and anger, surrendering their own need to control the uncontrollable, in the name of patience, kindness and love.

As they walked this path together, my parents brought those qualities – of patience, kindness, and love – out of all of us, time and time again. And in her illness and death, mom left me with a lifetime worth of poignant, visceral reminders of what is possible when we are united by love instead of hate, when we continue finding the courage to bring love forth into our troubled world.

She had her demons, as do we all. For many years, I honestly felt I didn’t know her at all. And for many of those years, even worse, I felt that she didn’t know me. But now, as this one year anniversary of her death approaches, I can see that in some ways, she knew me better than anyone else ever has. In particular, she knew exactly what advice to leave me with, in telling me to just be myself. She, more than anyone, would know the struggle that those simple words entail for me, and she, more than anyone, could help me to know the moral imperative of doing it anyway. For even though it angered and frightened her sometimes, she always knew my heart. And in learning how to let her go, she showed me how to discover, and embrace, its tenderness AND its strength. To let its light shine. For her and me both, I am resolved to do just that. One step, one breath, at a time.

We’re all hopin’, we’re all hopeless
We’re all thorns and we’re all roses
We’re all lookin’ down our noses at ourselves

We’re all flawed and we’re all perfect
We’re all lost and we’re all hurtin’
And just searchin’ for somebody to love

We’re all liars, we’re all legends
We’re all tens, I’d want elevens
We’re all tryin’ to get to heaven, but not today

We’re all happy, we’re all hatin’
We’re all patiently impatient
And just waitin’ for somebody to love

We’re all good, but we ain’t angels
We all sin, but we ain’t devils
We’re all pots and we’re all kettles
But we can’t see it in ourselves

We’re all livin’ ’til we’re dyin’
We ain’t cool, but man, we’re tryin’
Just thinkin’ we’ll be fixed by someone else

We all wrangle with religion
We all talk, but we don’t listen
We’re all starvin’ for attention then we’ll run

We’re all paper, we’re all scissors
We’re all fightin’ with our mirrors
Scared we’ll never find somebody to love

We’re all good, but we ain’t angels
We all sin, but we ain’t devils
We’re all pots and we’re all kettles
But we can’t see it in ourselves

We’re all livin’ ’til we’re dyin’
We ain’t cool, but man, we’re tryin’
Thinkin’ we’ll be fixed by someone else

Just tryin’ to hold it all together
We all wish our best was better
Just hopin’ that forever’s really real

We’ll miss a dime to grab a nickel
Overcomplicate the simple
We’re all little kids just looking for love

Yeah, don’t we all just want somebody to love?

—“Somebody to Love”, by Kacey Musgraves