Today we celebrated Mama’s 90th birthday. We began the day early. We planted magenta flowers in her yard, cut back rose bushes, put up a screened canopy over her deck, mulched her flowerbeds, and power-washed her white fences.
We prepared a lovely lunch and hung a HAPPY BIRTHDAY banner. We had a beautiful buttercream frosted cake with raspberry layers. We brought in helium balloons with colored ribbons. We wore party hats and sang and took photos and hugged and kissed.
Today we celebrated 90 years of a life. But we celebrated so much more than that one life. We celebrated a family that amounts to over 75 lives and counting, from that one life.
We do not know how many more birthdays we will celebrate with Mama. This may have been the last or we may celebrate 10 more.
This is true, however, for every one of us, whether we are 90 or 60 or 30 or 10.
So we celebrate with Mama, as we celebrate all that came from her and all other lives that we touch. A celebration for one we love is a celebration of life for every one of us.
From one small spark comes a flame and from that flame, a fire that burns throughout time.
Happy Birthday to you, dear Mama, our past, our present and our future.