A Beautiful Soul

A beautiful soul remains beautiful in spite of the relentless and unforgiving march of time.

It has been a while since I’ve posted on my blog and there is a reason for that.

It is the relentless and unforgiving marching of time that has kept me from pouring my heart out because it was too painful to walk down that road.

My beautiful and loving, generous of spirit and enlightened 96 year old mother is not well.  Her health has hit a rough patch.  For the last two months we have been dealing with her health issues, fragile and broken bones, mending through the pain and torturous rehabilitation work she must face.

While she has suffered through the pain, I have shared, in part, the pain by living through her ups and downs. Her physical and emotional pain has weighed heavily on my heart, on my creative energy and soul.

My time is now spent thinking of my mother’s health and spirit and how best I can help her heal quickly and return to our loving home. When there is a moment in my day that I am not feeling heavy of heart, and by chance get a sparkle of creative inspiration, I act upon it, otherwise, I keep moving forward, one foot in front of the other, trying my best to help get my mom across that invisible finish line of healing and rehabilitation.

On the way to my gallery this morning, after  having checked in on my mother at the rehabilitation center, I stopped at Kaya’s, our local coffee shop.  There, my eyes landed on a magnolia blossom that hung heavy in a vase, its petals falling, browning, being ignored.  I leaned in closely.  I took a long inhalation and filled my lungs with its powerful, healing fragrance of bright lemon.  What was once, in its youth, brilliant white with a lemon yellow center, was now ivory colored with a muted and plain center.

What struck me was that the essence of the flower, its fragrance, was still very strong.  Its life force was still there, the soul of the flower withstanding the test of time…was still beautiful in spite of old age.  Though its petals were falling, its essence was radiant and young.

Immediately I saw the correlation between the flower and my aging mother.

I had been lulled into a false sense of “non-aging”, of  “immortality”.  Something inside me failed to register the obvious signs of aging; to accept the fact that her physical body was wearing out, getting tired.  And maybe, just maybe, that this body of hers was even considering the mutinous benefits of moving on, much like the tired magnolia.

I hadn’t see it coming because the fragrance of her soul, so strong and spiritual, so supportive and encouraging, so alive and ready to experience the new, so inclusive and accepting of all my friends and acquaintances, had fooled me in to thinking that she was never going to get old or ever leave me.

Thankfully my mom hasn’t left me yet.  However this was a harsh wake up call.  I’ve had to steel myself for the inevitable.  Face the painful and heavy fact that one day, maybe in the not too distant future, she will be going on to her next journey.  I cried for nearly a solid week, trying to reason this all out and accept the inevitable.

And today, nearly two months later, I had a chance encounter with this fading magnolia blossom…the blossom whose fragrant life force was still sharing beauty with anyone who was curious enough to lean in and inhale.

This too is the gift my mother continues to impart on me and anyone else who orbits her energy field.  All we have to do is lean in and absorb her beautiful strength, love, compassion and yes, her youthful fragrance!