She came to me in a dream. And she hugged me.
She wasn’t sick; she was her healthy self and I felt her hug—actually felt it while I slept—her arms around me as she told me “It’s okay mija. It’s okay.”
And I could see her, I could hear her voice. Not a jumbled foggy indiscernible sound as is typical of most dreams—her voice was clear, strong, and healthy. “It’s okay mija” she repeated as she hugged me tight. In my dream she was healthy and strong. And alive.
She was forgiving me for not seeing her for years for not visiting her when she was sick for not calling to tell her she mattered—though I never got to ask her for forgiveness. She forgave me anyway.
It was the first of the women who mothered me, of the tías, of mom’s peers someone she had grown up with… “mi mejor amiga, mi amiga mi prima” she would say as she examined the recuerdito they gave at the funeral. Her picture was on the shiny paper with beautiful words and flowers and mom couldn’t put it down it was so hard on her. That recuerdito became enshrined by her bed. It was all that was left of her prima other than the memories only visible in her head.
But all I could think of after we buried her was I can’t believe I never saw her, visited, called her told her I cared, told her she mothered me. She rattled my world with such force I would never be the same. I can’t believe I did that.
I had known she was sick but didn’t know how sick; or didn’t listen enough to know how sick. I didn’t want to listen… every time mom talked about a blood transfusion they had given her, the chemo, how frail her body was, I simply didn’t listen. I mean, who would think she could be that sick, that she’d be gone she was so young? But she was. She was gone.
I would never again watch her drink iced tea and clean and rock out to Led Zeppelin and hear her tell me I should be more patient with my mother and watch her be the most perfect mother to us all… I just didn’t want to listen…if I didn’t listen it wouldn’t be real. But now here she was in my dream, telling me it was ok, hugging me still mothering me. Forgiving me.
Now, I make sure to listen. I listen. She made me listen.
estoy desgranando 