Note: This is a post I made on April 20, 2020.

Dear Mom,

You’ve been gone two years now, and not a day goes by that I don’t think about you and miss you. The clock that you got for your retirement now hangs at my house, and every time it chimes it’s a memory of you. The sound sometimes wraps around me like a hug from long ago.

I often spend time in the little living room that we put together with your furniture that has lasted since my childhood. At Christmas we ate and played cards at the same dining table that you bought when I was a little girl, and we used your china that still sits in your china cabinet, although it’s now in Buda rather than in Lubbock. 

Today I let myself cry when I felt like it because I miss your physical presence. I miss your laughter and all the funny things you would say. But most of all I miss your hugs and the way you would quietly pat my hand when we were together. I miss being able to share things with you. 

Just last night while watching the Michael Jordan documentary on ESPN, I was thinking about how much you would have enjoyed it and how you would have probably called after the show to reminisce about how together we watched UNC win the 1982 national championship the spring of my senior year in high school before I made my own journey to Chapel Hill as a freshman and how you had to convince Daddy that it was OK for me to go so far away from Lubbock and Texas for college so I could attend the best journalism school. I can imagine you commenting about how wonderful Dean Smith was and how much you love “Uncle Roy” Williams. You would also probably be as excited as I am about each new stellar recruit that Mack Brown picks up now that he’s back in Carolina blue.

Even though I knew it would cause a waterfall of tears, I listened to “Supermarket Flowers,” which we played at your funeral. The lyrics describe you perfectly for me.

Oh I’m in pieces. It’s tearing me up, but I know
a heart that’s broken is a heart that’s been loved.
So I’ll sing Hallelujah,
You were an angel in the shape of my mom.
When I fell down, you’d be there holding me up,
Spread your wings
And I know that when God took you back he said, “Hallelujah,
You’re home.

You truly were an angel in the shape of my mom. I’m glad that you’re back home with Daddy now. Give him a hug and a kiss from me, and tell him that I miss him too. I love you, Mama.

Note: I recently made this tribute video for her.