I Trace Her Smile

I trace her smile, and then her blonde curls. I spray her scarf with her favorite perfume and sniff her as I place it around my neck.

"Jillian! What are you doing?" I hear in the living room. "I am getting ready to leave. Aren't you coming?" The TV is blaring, and it sounds like a busy train station in there.

"Leave me for a few hours. It's that time of year again," I yell back, a bit irritated that I have been interrupted. "I need the space please. Take a long time, and have fun!" I say in the most cheery, heart- felt voice I can muster.

I retrace that intoxicating smile and her messy blonde curls, which instantly places me right back with her. Her scent surrounds me. He feel her breath, her calm voice in my ear.

Now, I smile at the memory of those few Taco Bell splurges- when it was just the two of us."

"Okay, I am leaving!" comes the intruding interruption again.

With a furrow in my forehead, I yell back, "Okay, I love you!" To myself, "damn it. You know what day it is. Why are you assailing me?"

I feel the furrow setting in, and it triggers her fingers rubbing out the number 11 in between my brows. I smile and try to change my expression to erase the already setting in lines, then I lovingly fall back to our Taco Bell memories of the two of us. She had such little money, but I was small and could only eat one taco. She had an Enchirito or a Beefy Tostada and we shared a small drink. (I still take a huge whiff of the taco before I take it out of the wrapper to remember those treasured moments.) I remember the chairs connected to the tables in the small restaurant, and the echo when adults spoke. I remember, her smiling down on me as she watched me eating my taco with my little mouse bites.

I remember making her laugh so hard she would beg me to stop for fear that she'd pee her pants. I remember her silliness. We would laugh so hard, it would irritate my dad. I remember her rebellious stubbornness. I remember her struggles when her car broke down in the middle of the highway and my dad couldn't get us because he worked out of town. I remember she'd buy me a soup, 7-Up, and a toy after Dr's visits when I was sick. I knew she couldn't afford it even when I was that little. I remember her sandwiches.

It took me years when I married for the second time to understand the ingredients of her sandwiches. I could never get them right even when I used the same ingredients. It was when my husband made me one that I put two and two together- I realized the ingredients were Love.

I begin to go through her pictures, smiling as I do. Her skinny, young pictures, her pregnancy pictures, her get-that-camera-out-of-my-face pictures, her holding back tears pictures, her silly-faced pictures, and the countless holiday and vacation pictures.

I sob when I think back to the first signs of her illness. Why didn't I do more? Why did I fight with her? Why did I move out at 17? Why didn’t I go to Walmart with her when she asked to keep her company? Why…, but I shake myself out of that bad state of mind. This is not what today is about, and I refocus on her goodness, charity, and self-sacrifice, love, generosity, her smile. I retrace it.

I listen to the voice-mail messages she left me, crying again as I hear, “Hello Kitten, give me a call.”

Time to watch the few videos of her, and it makes me smile again. Her goofy smile, her exaggerated smiles, her talking eyes, our inside jokes.

It's now time for the long-winded but now very-much-appreciated words that she wrote in my birthday and Christmas cards. I take a deep breath and begin to read her sage advice, her feelings, her hopes, her dreams for me.

I pull out the book she gave me. I smile and my tears flow readily as I reread the dedication that I have read easily thousands of times. She writes:

“Jillian,

This beautiful story is something that our family has also helped to fulfill. I hope you realize in honesty and heart-felt sincerity that I decided at a young age to do my share in bringing races together in true unity. I have recently realized that as far as the world has come, there is much progress to be made. I hope, though, my precious princess, that the part you played in helping to refine the world was not a difficult one. If it was, my love, I am sorry, but I hope you realize the importance of changing prejudices among the races. You, my love, are a great young woman. Excel and represent yourself and what I have taught you well, because you represent those teachings but also me as your parent. You are already a Great One among mankind, continue to be. Much Love”.

Wiping my tears, I rifle back through the pictures after I read every single card, reset my goals to live up to her mission, and I smell her scent on her scarf as I bring it to my nose one last time.

I look in the mirror to find traces of her in me, but my younger sister gobbled up most of her genes- the blonde hair, green eyes, skinny (but fitting for her frame) legs, her patience, and her kindness. I place my arms in the sunlight so I can see my mutant half blonde, half black arm hairs, and I know she's in there. I have inherited her stubbornness, attention to detail when putting projects together, her insatiable attitude for staying up into the next day to finish one of those projects she started way too late, and her self-righteousness. I gather her pictures, the cards, the book, her scarf, and her perfume, and place them into a sunflower box until next year.

"I love you, Mama. You are the ideal Beauty because you were the first face I saw when you looked at me from your Love. I hope you are finding the happiness you lost those last twenty-five years of life. Please send us guidance as we try to mend our hearts. Happy fifth anniversary of your death, Mama. I will see you next year."

I gather the strength I will need to continue living up to her ideal beauty as the lid closes on her scent, her smiling, hopeful face, her curls.