Harriet

I have been thinking about my mom, Harriet, a lot lately. Harriet, like all of us, was a complicated human being. I have many physical and emotional traits that I share with Harriet.

I'm going to wander around a bit in this post, but please, stay with me. Twenty-four years ago today, my dad died. He had suffered with Alzheimer's disease for the last years of his life. Mom took amazing care of him throughout his illness and through his death.

Mom never truly recovered from Dad's death. Even though she lived nearly nineteen years without him, she never came fully back to the person she was when she was not just Harriet, but also George's wife.

That is one reason I think about Harriet so much. I want to honor Cecil's memory, but I don't want to live a shadow life. I want to live a rich, full, meaningful life again.

So I am trying to build that life. I have volunteered with an organization that provides services to the Down syndrome community and their families. I have been working on my training in advance of service, and have my orientation scheduled. I'm terrified every step of the way, but excited too. And that brings me back to remembering an attribute of Harriet's that I share. Harriet was a dreamer. She imagined all sorts of wonderful outcomes to everything. Every lottery ticket was a million dollar winner. Every new job would end up with the candidate being president of the company. Every college career embarked on ended with Magna Cum Laude honors at graduation.

The difference between me and Harriet is she was never disappointed when those big dreams didn't come true. She just embarked on the next big dream. And that big dreaming is what got lost when Dad died.

I am still dreaming big, but I have always struggled with reality when my dreams don't materialize. Logically, I know one volunteer opportunity will not fill the Cecil sized hole in my life It will take a multitude of activities, and building new communities of people to interact with. So I have to temper my expectations, and let pragmatism rule.

And I wish I could be more like Harriet, and just dream big and roll on to the next big dream without any disappointment for the dreams that don't come true.

In the meantime, I will keep trying to build that rich, full, meaningful life, and I will think of Harriet's eternal optimistic dreaming, and strive to be more resilient when reality doesn't live up to those optimistic dreams.