To My Dear Mama

I published this post last year just two years after my mother passed away and I decided I would post it again to celebrate the life my mother lived so well.

Happy Mother's Day to all of my fellow bloggers, many of whom have also lost their dear mothers.

This was my mother at about the age of 12.


This is a photo of my mother the day I got married (March 17th,1973). She passed away two years ago on May 19th. She was the single most influential woman in my life.

Below is a photo of my mother when when I was just a new born.

Below is a photo of my mother holding the first of three granddaughters. She loved her granddaughters more than life.

As she aged she became more beautiful with each passing year.

Hegge Rozier-May14,1923-May19,2007

The following is what I wrote and read at my Mother's funeral:

When I was in grammar school I remember coming home to the scent of my mother’s lipstick and her Channel #5 Perfume lingering in the hallway. She always smelled delicious. To this day her scent brings happy memories of home flooding back. I remember the feeling of cream on the doorknobs of our home where she left her mark. Mom never went to bed without curlers in her hair and cream on her face. She was known for her classic good looks and gorgeous skin, however, all vanity aside, my mom had the secret to real lasting beauty. It was the what she believed about health and aging. She always said “you are only as old as you think you are”. When asked her age she would reply “Can you keep a secret?” the reply would always be yes ( no one can ever admit to not being able to keep a secret) to which she would always reply “So can I”. To my sweet mama age was irrelevant.
Mom knew how to live well and how to celebrate life down to the simplest occasion. My sister Nonie and I were raised on classical music and candlelit dinners. Sometimes mom would have to take private clients in the evenings and on Saturdays in order to make ends meet, but we always had dinner together with good food, beautiful table linens and flowers from the garden.
After Nonie and I were fast asleep my mom would polish our shoes and prepare lunches for the next day. She was a tireless worker with more energy than anyone I’ve ever met with the exception of my husband. I’ve always joked that I married my mother. I believe it was all my mother’s best qualities that attracted me to Richard.
Above all else my mother loved being a mother and not just to my sister and me but to many of my closest friends she was known as Mutti (German for Mother). Mom lost her own mother at the tender age of eight and I believe my grandmother must have passed on some awesome mother energy to my mom.
Mom was an incredible role model for Nonie and me. Not only was she a fabulous mother but she was also an incredible friend.
In fact, I am still in touch with many of my childhood friends today because of my mother. Before the age of e-mail my mother was a terrific letter writer and kept in touch with friends all over the world including many of my friends. Although fiercely independent Mom was deeply aware of how much we need each other.
She taught me most of what I know about loss. When mom
lost her father, just before being reunited with him after years of separation, she exhibited unwavering faith and strength. She believed that everything happens for a reason and in it’s own time, and we are not to question the Almighty’s plan or waste any of life’s precious time feeling sorry for ourselves. I had a difficult time with that one but I trusted my mother’s words.
She suffered much loss in her life. She was the last of her siblings to survive and in the last few years she had lost countless life long friends all younger than herself.
When my father passed away, my mother showed up in Fresno against my father’s wishes to say her goodbyes. There was no convincing her not to come, because she understood closure and forgiveness -- not to mention she was the most doggedly stubborn person you’d ever want to meet. Somehow she just knew it was
extremely important.
Her most tragic loss, of course, was when she lost my dear sister to a brain tumor in 1978. Both my mother’s life and my own were changed forever in an instant My mother never really recovered. So many conflicting emotions lay just beneath the surface and yet she lived to see her three granddaughters grow into beautiful young ladies and to reach a lifelong goal of accompanying each one of them, separately, on a trip to her homeland (by the way, not an easy journey for any of them) but she did it to share a piece of herself and her history with them. Mom lived to witness the birth of her three great-grandsons. She was so elated to be alive to welcome her boys into the world.
My mother’s life was a gift to all who had the pleasure to meet her. I will always love her, now and forever.
Be at peace, my sweet mama.