Orphans

Three days ago, on Tuesday, an hour before the phone call, I had finished a day of teaching and was writing lesson plans for today, when my wife and I were planning to arrive in Puerto Vallarta right about now.

It was my sister on the phone calling to tell me that she was with our mom at the hospital, and that it was time for me to come.

I left the next morning to cross the country so that I could be with Mom at what, that same evening, became her death bed.

Tomorrow is the first of two memorial services we will hold. It will be at the retirement home where Mom has spent the past 4 years living on a unit along with others who have memory problems.

My sister, from whose house in Virginia I am writing this, has been a weekly companion and caregiver for Mom during this time.

Our plans are fragile flags claiming country we hope to inhabit. The earth can shift in a second, changing boundaries, rivers, lives.