A Crazy Day, with a "Valentine" from Ricki

    Yesterday  wasn't really that crazy of a day, but it got off to a bad start. On awakening this morning, I thought that I had overslept a half hour, and jumped quickly out of bed. Afraid that I would be late for my first physiotherapy session for my shoulder, I started panicking. Then, AFTER  all that adrenalin had flooded into my system, I realized that I had arisen an hour and a half too early!! At least that meant that I had plenty of time, but returning to sleep was out of the question.

    The physiotherapist was very nice, and seemed quite competent. However, part of the treatment was an "uncomfortable" +6 on the 1-10 pain scale.   In the end I used my old Lamaze breathing to get through the twenty minutes of electrical "massage" of the torn muscle.

    On my return home I proceeded with my "pre-before Passover cleaning". This is organizing things in the house, and cleaning of items that do not need cleaning before Passover per se. (But things I want to get clean anyway.)  This type of spring cleaning I do prior to real "Pesach (Passover) cleaning", IF I HAVE TIME. And one of those jobs is to dust off and air the books in our huge library. Having finished yesterday airing out the Hebrew books, I turned my attention today to the books of the "special needs" lending library. And the books were quite dusty, as last year I did NOT clean them. (I mentioned already that I do this only if I have time, right?)

    As I lowered a handful of books from the upper shelf, a piece of paper, apparently used as a bookmarker, fluttered to the floor. It was a letter from Ricki to me, from who knows how long ago.  I had not remembered that I had this, and to be gifted with this "find" today truly warmed my heart.

(rough translation)  :

   "You are a good girl, and very very nice. You are a good girl and very wonderful. Very  very. You are (very very) my mom. You are a successful student in every class. Today you are as sweet as honey. You are my mom, and I love you."

[Note: she writes in the same style of language people praised HER with –"good girl", successful student". And she was probably trying to apologize for some type of misdemeanor…..]

   I sent a photo of the letter to my youngest son, and he posted it on facebook, adding:

  "Do you realize how much love she contained? Understand that we received as a gift a wonderful and sweet girl… we spent 18 years with her, and today, even though she is not here with us, we still feel her love for us, and discover new things about her.  We find ourselves thinking of her, crying over her, missing her, and smiling. Smiling because she knew how best to make us smile."

     Oh yes, my son is so correct. Even when we were upset with her, it was hard to be truly angry.  And this one-day-early "valentine" is going to get laminated and kept. I guess I'll need a different bookmark.

   And while I'm posting, I'll share my latest "mosaic"; I had lots of time, and the weather was balmy (not too hot nor too cold)… so I had the chance to do something a bit more intricate than usual: