A Tribute to Mothers

A Hurricane with My Mother’s Name Would Not Destroy Me

by Victoria Register-Freeman

BOARD UP! GET OUT! I received those four capitalized words in an email from the former owner of my 100 year-old Jacksonville Bed & Breakfast. With the hurricane season launching a lethal storm almost hourly, I had emailed her to see if she had any hints about ways to survive.

Carol is one of the people who shows up weekly in my Naikan reflections. She ran this B&B for 16 years before passing it on to me. She now flits around the globe but she is always quick to respond to my questions. Why does the furnace sound like a hippo in labor? What kind of breakfast is good for both a vegan and a militant South Beach dieter?

I thank the B&B deities that she is my mentor in the hospitality industry. As a former junior high school teacher, I am frequently clueless in my new world. A devotee of the Robert Kennedy school of advice giving, she always “tells it like it is.” I trust her. She is not a woman who panics easily. Still, she felt a Category 4 hurricane is an opponent that demands flight, not fight….

Finally

by Gregg Krech

The following letter was inspired by Gregg Krech’s reflections during a two-week Naikan Retreat in Japan. During the retreat the author was deeply struck by the depth and breadth of the care he had received throughout his childhood. He felt compelled to acknowledge this by offering his sincere appreciation to his mother in a letter he composed spontaneously after finding a robin’s nest in the garden. He realized that, throughout his entire childhood, he couldn’t once remember saying thank you to his mother.

Dear Mom,

I hope this letter finds you doing well and that your back is feeling a bit better. I’m thankful to have the opportunity to see you next week – a delayed mother’s day meeting – and I look forward to my visit….

Life After Death:
Tools for Coping with Grief

by Blaze Ardman

Cemeteries don’t rank high on my list of places to go on my summer vacation. That’s not to say I’ve never meandered through one or two really old ones. Pulling back the weeds to check out ancient headstones, the engraved names barely discernible, worn away by time. But this cemetery in which I now find myself is different. It’s new and modern and it contains my personal history. The marble glistens, and even though my father just passed away six short weeks ago, his name is already carved next to my mother’s on their “True Companion” vault, six levels up, with a water view.

This is my fifth visit to this cemetery, and the first one I’ve made by myself. After my mother died, on my subsequent trips to Florida to see my dad, he and I went together. I wouldn’t have minded a solo trip, but he always insisted on accompanying me. Yet he also wanted to make a quick getaway, so we’d drive about an hour each way to hang out for just five minutes. Today, there’s no rush, and don’t I wish there were?

A Scroll was Found Between Two Hearts

by Romie Georgia

My mother was 96 years old when she died last month. This tiny woman, child of immigrants from the Ukraine, lived through two World Wars, the Great Depression, and countless economic and political upheavals. Her childhood was cruelly marked by a misguided radiation treatment, which destroyed her health and physical well-being. She never expected to live past the age of fifty (when both her parents died).  Had she died 46 years ago, I would be writing a very different story.

I grew up during the thrill of psychology’s early promise, and we were a very modern family. When I seemed moody or sullen or jealous of my brother, help was available in the form of therapy. I began play therapy at a very young age and wandered through a succession of experts promising to relieve me – and my family – of myriad uncomfortable feelings.  As I matured, I hardened into the certainty that my mother was the true cause of my psychological problems. She was the villain in our family – the root of all our unhappiness and misery.

Honoring Your Mother After She Has Died

by Gregg Krech

Gregg Krech compiled the following suggestions for those who want to honor their moms after they have died.

For the past twenty years I have been conducting retreats in which a person spends a week reflecting on his or her entire life (Naikan retreat). A participant always begins with her mother and a central part of the reflection is remembering the details of what was received from her mother from the time of her birth until the present day. But in many cases, the person’s mother has already died. On Mother’s day, how do we create a celebration for our mother when she is no longer alive? Here are five possible ideas:

1. Spend time reflecting on your mother using Naikan’s three questions.