Off the Cuff

I never know what will happen

Sometimes I just write what comes up. This came up the other day, and I thought for Mother’s Day I’d honor her with an honorable mention. She made contributions that I know now were hard and I’m sure she didn’t like what it looked like at her first review of it. But in this case, it made a big contribution to how I have lived my life and found what it took for me to find forgiveness. It’s not what you think for my last meal of this life.

Last Meal

I might like my mother’s cornbread recipe with the cast iron skillet she baked it in.

I might like her pot roast cooked in her pressure cooker before it got tossed as out of date, worn out.

I might like her jelly that she made from the plums off the tree in the backyard that she spent days cooking them down. There was that much off the one tree. When you harvest like that, you put them up for the whole year, so it takes some time to do. I had to learn to like it, it didn’t start anywhere near sweet enough for me as a kid. Liking it only came after I grew up and left the house. Ahh, the visit home was nice though.

I might, but I don’t miss it much anymore. Too much time has passed.

My last meal won’t be over food though there were some great meals. I think it’s going to be me feasting on the memories.

I don’t doubt for a second that food will be the last thing on my mind if I know death is whose knocking on my door. I might lament all those times when I wasn’t patient, kind, compassionate, giving, caring, sharing or all those others I failed to exhibit. I’ll spend my last meal ruminating all the things I might have done just to get that part of it out of the way. Yes, I do believe we get a life review. I remember saying once, I had to call for an instant replay because it flew by so fast, I missed what it showed.

Then I’ll focus on what matters most. How come I didn’t see that as a gift at that time? How come I let that event really hurt? How come I hurt her like that? How come she hurt me like that? I was kind and that didn’t land right. I was loving and that wasn’t accepted like I meant it. I was compassionate too, when I think of all those feelings that I experienced with those that were truly hurt. I felt it, what they were, going through, I knew.

I could feel the pain because I had my own. I could feel loneliness and abandonment because I had my own. I felt the pain of love lost because I had my own. I felt the hurt indeed. But none of it broke me. It gave me the eyes to see, the heart to feel and the mouth to speak. And someone put a pen in my hand.

To write the words that might transcend. Make someone wake to find a phrase that helps them gain their sight. Maybe they will find that kernel of hope that I left on the paper and couldn’t take with me when I drew that last breath. Maybe they’ll get a message I didn’t know I was sharing. A word of love perhaps, I meant to. And then maybe someone will do that nasty thing and put a pen in their hand and say write and they will.