I have teamed up with a wonderful team of bloggers who participate in “Five Minute Friday.” Here’s the skinny: Every Friday for nearly four years hundreds of people joined a kind of writing flash mob. We write for five minutes flat. All on the same prompt that is posted by the the team starting at 10pm EST on Thursday night and all through Friday. And we connect on Twitter with the hashtag #FMFParty (It stands for Five Minute Friday Party). No extreme editing; no worrying about perfect grammar, font, or punctuation. Unscripted. Unedited. Real.

The prompt for this week: HAPPY

 – – – – – – – – – – –

My last “happy” was 5 years ago. There have been smiles and hugs since. There have been new memories and amazing milestones. Heck, there has even been singing in the car and dance parties. But pure happiness is hard to find without “my person” in this world.

Prior to February 2, 2011, I didn’t realize just how HAPPY and complete my life was. Then, my mom died very suddenly at the young age of 52. She left without a trace, and it would be days before we knew the “why.” With her passing, she took my full happiness. She took my innocent ability to feel like home was always just a phone call away. With her tragic end, life in my mind will always be defined as the before and the after.

In retrospect, it doesn’t feel like my post is full of HAPPY. However it is. My heart is full of HAPPY memories of a HAPPY life with my HAPPY mom. The HAPPY that I pass onto my children each day is a reflection of the life that she gave me. I am so, SO grateful to have grown up with her as my mom. I had 30 years with her. To learn her ways, to receive her guidance, to soak in her advice, to feel her love. What she gave me was easily enough to be carried with me each and every day, for the rest of my life.

My mom, and her memory… Makes me happy.