Off the pool float and onto a slab of concrete!

I have recently moved back out of my mother's home after a year long stint. I intended the stay to be temporary but time quickly slipped by as it does and I ended up there for over a year. I packed all my worldly possessions into storage and took just the essentials. The essentials meaning my dogs, most of my clothes and my DVD collection. I packed all my furniture and bought an air mattress that we affectionately called my "pool float" and set up like I was going camping on my mother's bedroom floor. I now rent a room and hauled some things from storage, one being my bed that people tell me closely resembles a queen sized slab of concrete but it still makes me feel more like a human than sleeping on the pool float ever did.

She was ever-so patient and only dropped the "subtle" hint that I wasn't as neat as she would like every once in a while although I'm sure it came to her mind about every hour or so. She helped me with my dogs and made things as easy as she could for me given the tight quarters. Now I miss her little idiosyncrasies and our late night banter and as I sit in silence in my new room I think of her waking up violently in the middle of the night in a full blown hot flash yelling out when I question what she's doing, "It's hot in here, damnit!!" and when I chuckle at her she would follow it with a sharp and poignant, "Well it is!!" I also in some sick way miss her polluting the air with giant farts; that she claims came with no warning mind you even though she would physically lift half her body to let it escape into the atmosphere without any speed bumps to slow it down. Sometimes she truly was not aware that she had done it because she was fast asleep but I don't sleep well at all so in the quiet wee hours of the morning I would be audience for her one-man band. Let me tell you, she has talent in that area that surpasses most.

I am reminded of her almost daily practice, until we got a DVR, of sitting on my computer with her feet on the recliner and her wire rim glasses perched on the tip of her nose like an angry librarian. She was listening to a Rush Limbaugh podcast while Judge Judy was on the one household t.v. on mute. Clearly she had Bogarted any and all forms of electronic entertainment we had. I was forced to watch Judy but to the sound of Rush, I called this fantastic show "Judge Limbaugh" and we laugh about it like friends with a fabulous inside joke but you are all let in it on it now so count yourselves among the lucky.

I have no cable nor internet in the room I rent from a friend about 10 minutes from my mom's so I have been catching up on reading and gotten back to revisiting my DVD collection. It's nice to be on my own again but I miss my mom. I know that it wasn't the ideal situation for either one of us but she helped me and I her and the memories of making my mom laugh until she begged me to stop before she peed her pants will forever be fond ones. Just goes to show you that life is what make of it! It's all in your attitude and for generations the women in my family have had plenty of that to go around!