{"id":12366,"date":"2012-12-21T23:57:50","date_gmt":"2012-12-22T07:57:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=12366"},"modified":"2012-12-21T23:57:50","modified_gmt":"2012-12-22T07:57:50","slug":"my-mothers-last-words-to-me-before-she-died","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/my-mothers-last-words-to-me-before-she-died\/","title":{"rendered":"My Mother’s Last Words to Me Before She Died"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Tinka<\/a>
A few months before she died, my mother celebrated my birthday with a chicken, berry and candied walnut salad at the Nordstrom Cafe. Photos by BF Newhall<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Barbara Falconer Newhall
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

My mother\u2019s last words to me were nothing much. No parting words of love. No heartfelt messages to the grandchildren.<\/p>\n

Two days before she died, as I was about to leave her hospital bedside, I told her I\u2019d take her to lunch at our favorite lunch spot the following week. Her voice was weak, but she smiled gamely and retorted, \u201cI\u2019ll pay.\u201d<\/p>\n

A day later, on the night before she died, she lay in bed with her head propped up on pillows eating a little soup with help from a caregiver at her assisted living residence. When the caregiver left the room, my mother turned her head on her pillows and said, \u201cGet me some water, would you, Barb?\u201d<\/p>\n

No please. No thank you. Just a matter-of-fact, \u201cGet me some water, would you, Barb?\u201d<\/p>\n

In the two years since my mother\u2019s death, I\u2019ve often felt short-changed by our last moments together. My mother died a few days before the winter solstice. Today it is the winter solstice again. The days have darkened and grown shorter, and I\u2019m feeling that old sadness again, guilt even, that I failed to make our last days and hours together more meaningful and more profound for her \u2013 and for me.<\/p>\n

And so, this afternoon, I took time out from Christmas shopping to have a memorial lunch in honor of my mother. I stopped in at the Nordstrom Caf\u00e9, our favorite spot, and ordered the<\/p>\n

\"Barbara<\/a>
Yet another mother-daughter lunch.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

chicken salad with blue cheese, sugared walnuts and fresh berries, the salad my mother always ordered when we lunched here together.<\/p>\n

Sitting there, with my mother\u2019s blackberries and strawberries before me, I realized for the first time how much of my mother \u2013 and me \u2013 there actually was in those words, \u201cI\u2019ll pay.\u201d<\/p>\n

We had both laughed when she offered to pick up the check, because, as the elder in our twosome, that\u2019s what she\u2019d always done. We laughed at how predictable we were. We laughed at how much we relished being predictable.<\/p>\n

My mother\u2019s words, \u201cI\u2019ll pay,\u201d reminded us both of the good times we\u2019d had at our mother-daughter lunches over the years — no husbands, no brothers, just two pretty ladies out on the town.<\/p>\n

For example:<\/p>\n