Happy Mother's Day, Mama

This will be the first Mother's Day I've spent without having a mother. My wonderful Mom, passed away last August and she is greatly missed by all of us.

Because I didn't have enough time or the right environment to write my eulogy, I realized I didn't say so many things I wanted to say at her funeral. I've always needed an isolation booth, just to answer hard questions like: What's your name? But that's another story. I had to find a place to have some tranquility to write my thoughts of her. The funeral was the next day and I was not only grief-stricken, but harried and frantic.

I ended up at Starbucks, of all places (not exactly the library), and wouldn't you know, the only available chair was next to a Chippendale dancer. Only in LA... He just had to tell me...I tried to explain that I needed quiet and the reason why. Instead, I ended up watching Youtube videos of himself strutting around on stages acting like a fool. Who cares?!? Not only did he drive me crazy; he didn't seem to care about my loss, then helped himself to half of my cheese plate! I remember thinking - "I can't wait to tell Mom about this"...

My Mom would give you her last dime. She had a great personality and loved to laugh. Her laugh made others laugh. She loved playing tricks on people and had a wicked sense of humor. After my sister and I watched the original version of "Invasion of the Body Snatchers", we were scared to death! While we were getting ready for bed, she went into our bedroom and used our pillows to form, what looked like pods. We screamed! We thought we would soon be pod people!

In 1956, she was diagnosed with throat cancer, which was a death sentence in those days. Not only did she have cancer; she was pregnant with one of my little sisters. They gave her extensive radiation, x-rays, chemo, cobalt treatments and every pain medication possible. They gave her six months to live and told her when the baby was delivered, there would be something wrong with her. The only thing that was "wrong with her", was the fact that she was only 8 lbs & 5 oz! The rest of us were 9 and 10 pounders. Not only did she beat the death sentence; she went on to live 56 years longer and had a lot of hard times, but she never stopped laughing, singing or dancing.

In 1959, she faked her way into The Kentucky Derby, pretending to be a photographer and ended up sitting in the box where the jockeys and other VIPS sat. They even interviewed her on National TV. I remember it well. She was like a carbon copy of Lucy Ricardo, only this was real life.

She watered a fake plant for years, tried to play the flip side of CD's, thought faxes would be delivered through the thresholds of her door, ordered a buttbuilder undergarment online, then disatisfied with the delivery time, sent an irate email to the company. In the process, she clicked on "reply to all", then got a slew of calls from friends and family who thought it was hysterical! She talked her way out of every ticket police tried to give her, wrote sympathy letters to every criminal in LA, made us fight a housefire when we were kids, In 1959, she drove 5 kids from Louisville, Kentucky across the new highway, Route 66, all the way to California - she was the only adult.  At one of the motels, the manager looked like Norman Bates in Psycho. We were all afraid, so she made us take our shoestrings out and tie all the windows tightly. I could go on forever, but I think I already did...

I miss and love you, Mama. Your Pegsy...