05/12/2025
My Mom.
Sometimes she was difficult. Dad had to apologize for some things she said to her kids. But she did the best she could do, and all told, the aggregate of her goodness and love were more than enough to give me warm smiles and sometimes hairs-on-end, especially when I remember how she would squeeze my hand gently at the soaring moments of an orchestral phrase, or a tenor in Verona, or a soprano at the Met...
At that time, I felt like the kid in Wonder Years, blushing, slumping slightly in my seat, but now, I know those feelings she had, and sometimes I squeeze my own hand, or the armrest of the Tennessee, at those same moments, before tears come.
Rolling down my face as the music overwhelms me, like that ultimate variation in the Rachmaninoff when it inverts, or the Massenet – 'Meditation' from Thaïs, I remember Mom.
Mary Charlotte Swann, born to Roxie Dixon and Melvin Swann in 1929, unknowingly about to traverse the Great Depression, just like my Dad across town.
I dwell on the greatest of times we had, with very warm feelings and occasional laughter out loud (then and now), --you'll notice I like Oxford commas-- Mom didn't, remembering the beautiful times and travels, and the occasional gem she would voice to me.
For example, I was around 10 and mentioned to Mom I hated being sensitive, someone close to me had just died, this happened often with me, like my first girlfriend in 1st grade, Laura High, had died in 1st grade. At that time I didn't know I was to experience many more deaths along my lifeline than some others I knew, and due to that, I can give a serious testimony. I hated being sensitive, said me, and Mom said, "Well, just imagine what the world would be like without any sensitive people at all."
My mind stopped at that instant, my heart went faster, I could imagine it, and it was terrible, almost like the moment in time we are experiencing right now, or at least some of us who aren't asleep, and I was changed by my Mother's words. My dear Mother! Oh how I miss her! Oh how I am so happy she chose during that 3rd bout with cancer to just let go, to not suffer any more chemical or surgical or impersonal procedures! Oh God! How I love my Mother!
