Now What?

My role as executor to Mom's will is winding down to a close. We are on the final leg of this journey and as soon as I mail the final documentation to our friendly, neighborhood taxation department, everything that happens from there will be out of my hands.

I have done the math. I have accounted for every penny which has passed through the estate. I have checked, re-checked and checked again, to ensure all interest paid has been duly reported. I have walked through every letter of taxation law with my accountant and I am satisfied that everything has been done as correctly as humanly possible.

I have documentation, facts and figures. I have come at these numbers from every conceivable angle I can think of. I fixate on these kinds of things. Numbers are tangible, provable and can be balanced to the penny.

I have done all I can do. Now we wait.

My definition of "who I am" has been wrapped around Mom for quite some time. As I let my mind relax and look back, I have few regrets. Mom and everyone around me encouraged me to focus on life beyond Mom while I was walking that walk. When everything became so very quiet after all details pertaining to Mom, her death and her estate, it was only then that I realized how very much of my identity was wrapped around defining myself as "Mom's Daughter".

I hunkered down and felt all I needed to feel. I was lost and without purpose for a while. My last real conversation with Mom cycled around in my head in a loop "What is your ten year plan?" she asked, as she leaned into the conversation and waited for my answer.

Sometimes, I still feel her waiting.

I have broken it down into segments. First of all - the present. My present day life is truly about as good as it gets. I still have all the flexibility I need within my roles and responsibilities. I am doing things that "matter", which is important to me. I feel valued. I feel like I give back. When I look too far down the road, my knees buckle and I feel weak. So I don't look that far. None of us knows what tomorrow will bring. "Prepare yourself but take it one day at a time" is my motto.

It is the time left over at the end of my day jobs that I struggle with. I have not quite yet defined who I am when I am not tending to someone else's needs. I remember the days when I would take my unspent energy and invest it in tending our home. I am trying to find that part of me again. But I want to be more than the keeper of a clean and organized house. At one point of my life, I joked that my children would most likely etch the words "She kept a clean house" on my headstone because I was not a warm and fuzzy, memory making kind of mom. But at least our house was clean. I have evolved.

I wrote these words four years ago. I was struggling but I was content. My son thought I was depressed and this was my response to a conversation we had:

"I am not perfect. I used to try to be. I wore myself out and beat myself up and kept trying and trying but I never attained the height that I had set for myself. I have evolved to the stage of my life where I am happy to simply be 'enough'.

I worry enough to get that-which-needs-to-be-done, done. I care enough to get through the day and fulfil the parts of me/life that need filling up the most. I am independent enough to know that I can lean a little bit and still be self reliant. I feel enough to empathize with you when you are feeling 'life' strongly.

Life is full of ups and downs, highs and lows, ebbs and flows. I used to expect more out of life, out of myself and out of you. I have let all of us off the hook and I am content and relaxed enough to just go with the flow and trust that it will all work out in the end."

I was content to simply be "enough" back then. Sometimes I forget how wise I used to be. I'm grateful I write these things down because I have found most of the time, I know the answers I am seeking. "It was within you all the time, Dorothy" (slightly paraphrased from "The Wizard of Oz")

I believe the part of me I am seeking right now is the part where I fulfil the parts of me/life that need filling up the most.

I'm still looking for your answer, Mom. It's coming. I can feel it a little closer every day.