Today I cleaned our master closet. It is a huge walk-in closet that we added a few years ago. I knew it needed cleaning, but even I was surprised by the two bags full of junk that went in the garbage. There was also a huge bag of clothes to be donated to next year's church garage sale.
I carefully straightened the pile of things I have from after Mother died. There are sympathy cards I received, pictures we displayed at her funeral and Mother's beautiful handprint that hospice gave us. It might sound kind of creepy to those who haven't lost someone, but I watched as the hospice worker inked Mother's hand and carefully pressed it onto several papers for us, after Mother died. It was done very lovingly and I know Mother would have approved. It is so neat to put my hand up to her handprint now. Even though I can no longer see her, I know there is not much more than the thickness of that paper separating us. I can feel her with me and hear her words of advice and encouragement.
When I opened my bottom drawer in the closet to straighten it, I knew some of what I would find. I have two Ziploc bags that contain dried roses from Mother and Daddy's funerals. I opened each bag and took a sniff. I expected to smell dried roses. But I swear that what I smelled was Mother's homemade raspberry jam. I know it sounds crazy. It was probably my mind playing tricks on me, but I sat there with my eyes closed and could see the farm kitchen with a bowl of freshly made sweet raspberry jam cooling, with a wooden spoon resting across the top of the bowl.
Under the bags of flowers, was one of my dad's white t-shirts, right where I knew I'd find it. I still don't know how it came to be in our house, but it is here to stay. Daddy always wore a white t-shirt under whatever he was wearing. As he became unable to dress himself, I helped him into and out of those t-shirts many times. It was sometimes hard to get his arms to bend and I often teased him that trying to get those t-shirts on and off of him was like trying to skin a raccoon. Daddy was little and actually wore a men's size small t-shirt. After he died and we were back at our house in Maple Grove, I did a few loads of laundry. As I was folding the clothes, there was a white t-shirt. It looked too small to be Eric's and too big to be Evan's, so I looked at the size tag. It was a men's size small. That meant it had to be one of Daddy's. Noone else I knew wore that size. But how it ended up in our laundry is beyond me. Mother and Daddy's room at the farm was downstairs. All the other bedrooms and all our suitcases were upstairs. Sure, I helped do their laundry, but their clothes were always put away downstairs. I decided that how it ended up home with me didn't matter. Apparently it was meant to come home with me. I told Mother about it and asked if she cared if I kept it. Since she had a drawer full of the t-shirts, she didn't mind. Whenever I come across that t-shirt it makes me smile.
As I made my way thru the closet, I came across a lot of crumpled pieces of paper. Most were old receipts or other things that were taken out of a pocket and left on a shelf. I looked thru them to make sure they weren't important before I tossed each one. I reached for yet another folded up piece of paper and as I opened it, I gasped. It was Mother's writing. It was a grocery list she had made. The strangest thing is that this is not the first time this has happened to me. A couple of months after she died, I was cleaning our hall closet and I found a different grocery list of hers. I knew that one had to have fallen out of my purse as some point and gotten hidden behind other things. I put that one away for safe keeping. The list I found today was longer. There is something about seeing her handwriting that is so amazing. It's not like she had super neat handwriting. It's just so obviously her's. And seeing something so ordinary as a grocery list in her handwriting is like a little hug from her. I wonder if I maybe found this list in one of the pockets of the clothes in her closet after she died and brought it home for that reason. I can't remember for sure. But no matter how it got there, I believe that I was meant to find it today.
After Daddy died, we went through his dresser and found two tiny little notebooks where he had written some of his favorite bible verses. His handwriting was undeniable. After he had his stroke, his right hand was a bit crippled, so his writing always had a bit of a jerkiness to it. It was rare to see him write much of anything other than his signature. But Bible verses he took the time to write. Many of the verses were ones that he had engraved on grandchildren's confirmation plaques. Others were just some of his favorites. Several months after he died, Mother told me I should bring those notebooks home with me. They are safely tucked away and I take them out every now and then to read the verses that meant so much to him and also just to see his handwriting. Again, it's like a little hug from him.
When I decided the master bedroom closet today, I figured that when I was done I would feel good about having a neat and organized closet again. I do feel good about that. But I also have a peacefulness and happiness inside myself. I know it's from feeling those little hugs from Mother and Daddy today. And that whiff of homemade raspberry jam didn't hurt either!
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