I'm here for a pick-up

This morning before I go to the office, I will go to the funeral home to pick up my mother's ashes. My chest is a bit tight at the thought of it, at walking in alone and carrying my mother in my arms when I leave. As I wrote that sentence, I shook my head in a bit of disbelief. Carrying my mother in my arms.

Earlier this morning, my uncle, her brother, and I had a long phone conversation over our morning coffee. He shared some memories I'd not heard before and on my end of the line he had me in his hands, thirsty for his words and delighting in his stories. He spoke of when he and my mother were children how they would skate in Central Park and then skate to the Museum of Natural History at 79th and Central Park Avenue. The Security Guard at the entrance was a man they knew as Sugar. Uncle Carl tells me, "Sugar knew us because we were there every day. That's when Mom and Dad were both working so we'd spend our afternoons at the museum. Sugar would greet us in grand gestures and open the door for us." Uncle Carl chuckled at the memory, "Oh the hours we spent in Central Park and that museum. Hours and hours, so much time."

I'll be thinking about that when I pick Mom up, her as a young girl skating with her brother through Central Park park on their way to the museum. That's as clear an image of my mother's character as there ever was. And I have it now. I have that knowledge, that story.