Mami-portrait

Switzerland, October 2012

This visit

    had

    some

        forever goodbyes

some one-sided 

                hellos

            from forever goodbye's

                of two years

                                    ago.

Yet also

    there where

    some new

            hellos    

            deepening of 

            connections

                        re-connections

Holding Hugging

            tears laughter

    sharing future dreams

            long lost memories

Circles closed

        circles opened.

 

Mami-portrait
My Mami, my Mother Rosmarie Aebischer-Kästli, January 14 1934 – October 16, 2012

Her brain injury was part of her but not her whole being. We often had to explain her to others so they could understand how she was different from somebody with a fully functioning short term memory. For the last 32 years of her life she taught all who met her a lot – patience, old sayings, love and faith. Most of all, we need to remember a woman who loved to laugh, to break out in song, who was full of love. A mother who was very tender and loving. A sister who kept her own siblings close even after her marriage to my dad in 1957. A patient who was always thankful. A woman who through her faith found peace with her tragic destiny – often through a joke.

When I was 12, I lost my Mami when she had her bike accident on August 18, 1980. Now, my mother died.

Her accident took away her ability to be herself and left her with the mental ability of a 10 – 12 year old child.

There are many stories of this part of my life – this place here, perhaps the place to tell some of them when the time is right. Perhaps. Perhaps not.

7

Spring/Summer 1969.

 

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