December 8th- Happy birthday mum.

Snow-capped mountains
Memories frozen in time
Sun melts through the pain.

I wrote the Haiku on Friday- mum’s birthday and what surprised me most is that this is the first year that I haven’t spent the day in tears, in fact I didn’t cry at all. I am not sure if this is some miraculous part of healing or because we are now at least home. All the other years I had to cope with both the feelings of loss and the separation by distance.

The snowy theme continued throughout the weekend and we set off on Saturday to visit Hays Garden Centre and in search of snow for Emily. We killed a few ghosts in Hays, it was a place I visited with mum one summer. We then drove up through Ambleside and snaked off to go up Kirkstone Pass to the third highest Pub in England, the highest inhabited building in Cumbria. As we drove past the chocolate box houses, with the gentle snowflakes falling, Mull of Kintyre was playing on the radio, and I was transported instantly back to Christmas past, as a youngster at Christmas celebrations with mum and dad and their friends and drunken antics and singing and I could hear mum’s laughter echoing through my head. The memory was so strong and this was when the tears were shed. The sense of both happiness and loss was overwhelming.

©Alison Jean Hankinson

Mum passed away 9 years ago in 2008, today was her birthday. XXX

This is my offering for d’Verse haibun.

Author: alisonhankinson

I am a school teacher and a mum and a red cosmic skywalker, and sometimes a netball coach...but beneath it all I am a writer...

28 thoughts on “December 8th- Happy birthday mum.”

  8. I am glad you found happy memories to share the tears with.

    Both of my wifes parents have passed and there are times I see their memories weighing heavily behind her eyes. Particularly around the holidays, and their birthdays. I try to keep it light those days and remind her that how she is living her life, is a great testament and tribute to them.

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  9. Your mom and my firstborn share a birthday. 🙂

    This is my favorite section of your piece:

    “As we drove past the chocolate box houses, with the gentle snowflakes falling, Mull of Kintyre was playing on the radio”

    I’m glad they were at least partially happy tears this year.

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  13. Wonderful photos….wonderful memories written here. Your description of the places and the feelings is so very good (chocolate houses!). It’s interesting….we carry our mums with us all the time…their connection, their mark is on our belly for our lifetime (our navel/bellybutton). I think that indelible connection is always strong…it’s just that the rawness of the losing eases over the years. Happy birthday to you mum….angels along the way for her and you.

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  18. A beautiful haibun Alison and I love the photographs too. I can just picture you at Hayes Garden Centre, a place we loved to visit when we lived in Cumbria, and all the synchronicities of life with your mum brought back by the music xxx

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