My Mother’s Purse

Every year Mother’s Day presents me with a wistful longing for my mom who passed away so many years ago. I meander through the pink and purple aisles of Mother’s Day cards, exhaling long sighs that breathe from the tender regions of my heart. It’s a mystery how, after over twenty years, my heart still aches on the second Sunday of every May.

Here is a heart hug from my memoir, She’s Still In There: Healing the Wounded Child Within.

Dad was scouring the house of Mom’s personal belongings and handing them off to the neighbors, Goodwill, or anyone else who wanted them. I caught on to this frenetic activity just in time to take possession of the belongings that were connected to my happiest memories of her.

As an afterthought, I grabbed Mom’s black leather satchel from her closet, the purse she carried everywhere during the last year of her life. I hung it on the doorknob of the walk-in closet at my new house and made a mental note to find a quiet moment and go through its contents.

You can learn a lot about a woman by examining the items in her purse. Secrets she never  told you. Items that carried meaning for her in intimate and personal ways. Essential things that she never left home without. If you examine them up close, if you touch them, absorb their fragrance, and interpret them through her eyes, they tell a story all by themselves.

Seated cross-legged on my closet floor, I pulled the bag to my chest and embraced it, allowing myself to enter her presence and draw close to my memory of her love for me. I then buried my face in its supple, leathery surface, breathing in the unique scent that was my mom. An earthy fragrance, a blend of hand cream and old tobacco smoke, triggered a flood of submerged memories. I then placed the bag on the floor and began to withdraw items one at a time from its dark interior.

Her indigo-blue leather wallet—it held no money except for some loose change in the coin purse. I found only expired grocery coupons and a business card from one of her doctors in the billfold. It also contained a small section for wallet-sized photos that held pictures of her grandchildren and one of my dad and her together at a family dinner. No money but plenty to treasure.

I grabbed her wad of keys, her car and house key still recognizable to me. A scratched, plexiglass key fob held a baby picture of Tyler, my brother’s son and her first grandchild.

I reached next for her cosmetic bag, a silky zippered pouch with a printed Asian theme. Inside I found her mirrored compact, a classy item in gold-rimmed metal that I imagined her picking up for a dollar at a garage sale. As I opened it and peered inside, a soft dusting of lilac-scented  powder wafted from its surface. I envisioned her looking back at me from the beveled mirror.

Hi, Mom—yes I’m snooping in your bag. Hope you don’t mind.

I withdrew her lacquered cloisonné pill case that held an array of essential medicines, separated into neat compartments. I opened a lipstick holder with a small, attached mirror and pulled out a tube of rose-toned, half-used lipstick. I tipped my head to one side and imagined her touching the lipstick to her mouth. I twisted the tube closed, resisting the urge to apply some to my own lips. Reaching into the bottom of the bag, I withdrew a white linen handkerchief with a scalloped edge and embroidered flowers. I pressed it to my nose, inhaling the scent of starched linen, and then refolded it carefully on my lap.

The leather satchel felt empty but as I opened it wide I saw one remaining item stuffed into the corner of the bag—a wadded up napkin. I grasped it and felt a hard, lumpy something under its paper surface. What is this? I frowned and withdrew the napkin, placed it in my lap, and unwrapped the petrified apricot scone from our last trip to LaBou six months before. White and as hard as a lump of granite, the ancient scone had not grown any mold. Even the bits of apricot appeared like chunks of amber buried in stone.

“I miss you. I miss you so much,” I whispered. Pulling my knees to my chest, I stared at the half-eaten pastry and lapsed into the memory of the last happy moment I had shared with Mom. The tight lid on my shelved box of grief eased open as tears spilled down my cheeks. I opened the embroidered handkerchief and pressed its scratchy fabric to my eyes. I looked over the personal artifacts of my mom’s life strewn across my closet floor and marveled at their meaning. Not less than a year ago, her hands had touched these items, hands that I would never be able to touch again. Their value took my breath away.

Mom was doing just fine in heaven and I did not wish her back. But right then, just for a moment, I yearned for her to get a kitchen pass from God and join me on the closet floor so I could hug her and tell her how much I loved her.

Can you spare her for just a few minutes God?

I mopped my tears with her handkerchief, waiting for my sobs to settle down. After a few moments, I breathed a deep sigh and replaced the items into Mom’s purse, including the now soggy handkerchief, and rehung it on the doorknob. I would open her purse often over the next year and handle her belongings, especially during troubled moments when I needed to feel her presence.

Everything, that is, but the scone, which I rewrapped and threw away. There are just some things you don’t get to keep.