All My Mothers

Yesterday our quilt group had their annual Christmas party. It's one of my favorite days of the entire year.

These women! These wonderful, cranky, loving, caring, old hags!

There's all kinds, you know?

• The one that's legally blind and mumbles all the time ... yet comes faithfully and can still tie the quilts beautifully.
• The one that has poor memory and has to ask me each week what my name is and how long I've lived in town.
• The one with MS that sits beside the one that had polio as a kid.
• The one with mental illness and an eating disorder that sits beside the kindest, gentlest woman you'll ever meet.
• The two that smell like an ashtray and have minds as sharp as tacks.
• The old grouch that used to run the event, but now is tied to her oxygen tank, now only able to wheeze out orders.
• Our mighty "mother superior" who is wonderfully irreverent. She now falls so often that she is covered in bruises.
• The two that used to teach in elementary school that gently guide us step-by-step through processes and keep us laughing with tales of days gone by.
• The child of the Great Depression that still hates to see any scrap of even the ugliest of fabrics hit the trash can.
• The one with a quirky sense of color.
• The one with the mouth of a sailor and a heart of gold that goes out to all canine critters.
• The recent survivor of breast cancer.

We're all so quirky. So individually interesting. So collectively talented and caring. The number of excellent cooks in the group! So many are widows. Too many whose children passed before they did. These women that take each other to doctor appointments, cook meals for the homeless, give of their time now that their treasure is gone. Give their hearts, their humor.

These lovely women who invited me into the room a decade ago when my own heart was rent because my mom died and my family lived so far away. They put a needle in my hand. Gave me a few directions. Started talking. Allowed me to listen. Took me into their hearts and became the sisters, aunts, mothers and grandmothers I so craved.

Yesterday, we were party animals together. We ate. We drank. We played games. We exchanged gifts. We reveled in each other's company and humor.

Then we put on our thick coats and hats, helped each other dust the snow from the cars, walked the lame through the gathering snow, and gathered each other into our arms and hearts once more. Some, likely for the last time.

These women!

I'm blessed to be one among their number.