This article was updated on March 30, 2023. It discusses ageing and motherhood.

Today a nod to all the mothers who have gone.

My mother died in 2011. These days I don’t miss her as much but I feel her presence very strongly. The connection is more revealed.

I feel her older woman’s body when I’m on my walk and my muscles ache or when I wish I was more nimble when I’m getting out of the car with my bags of groceries.

I hear her voice when I’m explaining something to a grandchild or when I laugh at something funny they’ve just said.

I am pleasantly surprised by how much sense she made. And her elder’s kind of wisdom is appreciated so much more by me now.

I’d like to reach out and have a cup of tea with her, sharing what we know, now that I know (almost!) as much as she did. But that is not to be.

And I wonder, is that the nature of ageing and motherhood? That all you can do is pass the knowledge along. In a way that’s good because it can’t go round in circles, in a tight unyielding loop.

If you’re missing your mother and need some new besties to share the journey with, listen to the Good Mourning podcast where two friends come together in the grief of losing their mums.

My friend Katherine wrote a terrific tribute to her mother I posted once before. It deserves the spotlight again, so here it is.

Things that I might forget on the first flight after my mother’s death