My Mother in the New Fade, Part 2

skipping around the narrative
a little, one of the key elements
of what can be called
my mother's mythology
ties into my father's as well:

both of them lost their mothers
before i was born

my father lost his in what became
the end of his tenure
with the Air Force

my mother lost hers in what became
for her
an equally impactful piece
of what helped shape her life
and brought my parents,
inevitably and finally,
together

she was still living at home
when her mother died
and could vividly recall
years later
the mystery the doctors
could not solve
and still baffled her years later,
the strange discolored legs,
and how she seemed to die,
just like that

so that my mother decided
to continue living at home
to help her father out

and it was this decision
that kept her in town long enough
to finally meet the man who had grown up
not so far away, a state but really just
a short walk away


it was a strange bit about family
that helped bring my family
together,
and a sad twist about mothers
that helped shape my mother's life
and then my own