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February and March were two of the hardest months of my life.  In some ways so short, but as one person put it, that time will probably stay in my memory better than many other periods in my life.

March 16th, very early in the morning, my beautiful mom finally surrendered in her long battle with ovarian cancer.  My heart is at times still aching and then simply frozen.  The funeral has passed, the family from out of town have come and gone, and the last of the flowers we’ve been given are dying in my kitchen.

My mom was the heart of our family.  The last month of her life, everything else stopped for me.  I went on a leave of absence from work to spend my days at the hospital.  No more capoeira.  For the most part any drawing I did took place right beside her hospital bed while she was napping.  I will always carry the moments of that last month in my heart.  It’s been a few weeks now and life still does not feel quite normal.

I had one colleague tell me early on that the way I handled my mom’s death would shape who I am as a person, and shape me later on for motherhood.  I still don’t know about that.  My experience in spending the last month of my mom’s life with her will be irreplaceable.  How I’ve dealt with it since makes me wonder if I’m cut out for anything.  I still have a bit of time left before going back to work and right now I would chalk a good night’s sleep up as an accomplishment.

I drew this picture for my mom while she was in hospital.  She always loved the beach, so I wanted to give her a beach house.   There were actually a few days then I was on a roll, and drawings were pouring out of me with very little hesitation.  I’m still trying to pick up my pieces, the bits and bites of my life if you will.  For right now though…there’s just this.