what i know what i don't

dear mom,

Happy very belated birthday, Mom. I wanted to take the day off just so I could be outside alone somewhere, but I had a plant trial and a presentation that day.

I also started this letter just shy of a month ago. And I found myself returning to this feeling that every day that goes by is another day late to writing you a birthday letter. And now we're into Mother's Day.

This day feels a little different recently. It's because I have friends who are moms themselves now, so I can spin my grief into joy and pour it into them now. It feels good to "celebrate" this day instead of dread it for all the cards and gifts and ad boards that advertise something I lost.

Still it hangs over me that I'll never know you as a whole person. My therapist suggested I write down the things I do know about you, and the things that I don't know but want to know about you. I never did that exercise because it was too sad to acknowledge how little I do know about you. I know that you were super smart, that you liked watching Chinese dramas, that you had a green thumb, that you nourished your friendships.

If I could have you over for Mother's Day, you know I would of course cook for you. I can't remember if I ever celebrated you on Mother's Day. Maybe I had colored a hand-drawn card for you at the instruction of my teacher, but did I ever celebrate you? I would celebrate you today, and I would ask you so many questions. They would flow out of me as quickly as they entered my mind. I would be greedy with your time.

I would prepare greens, spending just as much time picking and cleaning them, as you used to. Abundant water spinach leaves sauteed with garlic and oyster sauce. Snap peas, shallow fried in reserved bacon fat and dusted with roasted dulse flakes. I rarely make soup, but I know you would appreciate some soup. A coconut tamarind soup, different than what you're probably used to, but inspired by the palette of my Oakland mom. And of course a bowl of rice.

I would sit with you for hours at the sun-washed dining table, listening to you chatter away. We would keep refilling our bowls of soup and rice because there would be so much to catch up on. The entire life you lived before me.

At the end of the night, I'd be able to hug you tightly. I'd think about how it shouldn't require a special day to celebrate what you would've done for me, what you could've created for me. But time moves so seamlessly, doesn't it?

I miss the possibility of you,

Amelia