Taste Home

It was just a simple magazine -- an old copy of a cooking magazine called Taste of Home.  But the mere sight of it brought me to tears.

It must have been well over two years (ugh) since I last sorted my 'saved magazine' collection in the three-tiered basket bin of my family room.  Today I finally got to it.  A menial, unmemorable task to take care of -- until I stumbled upon that magazine.  

It was my mom's.  I remembered the day she let me borrow it.  I had stopped over for a visit and browsed the magazine as we sat and chatted.  She was fighting a nasty cough that wouldn't go away -- but as always, she was more interested in hearing about my family than talking about herself.  So as we talked, I turned the pages and a recipe in the magazine caught my eye as a contender for dinner later that night.  "Go ahead -- take it home with ya Cin.  I could use one less magazine here anyway," she said with her signature giggle.  Ok Mom, I will," was my reply.  "But it's brand-new so I'll bring it back -- I just want this one recipe."

Two years later, there it was -- still in my bin.  Yet another piece of unfinished business with my mom.  The symbolism brought me to tears.  So much had transpired since that visit two years ago.  The cough, we would soon find out, was a result of cancer in her lungs that all too quickly would take her life.  She too left unfinished business of her own: to see all her grandchildren graduate from high school or perhaps one day dance at their wedding or hold each and every great grandchild.