Sometimes I feel...

So, I don't know if it's because my birthday, the one I shared with my mother for 43 years, comes just two days after Mother's Day this year or if it's because she would have been 90 years old today, but I am having a very hard time having a happy birthday this year.

I don't mean that I'm not enjoying the fabulous weather and the few days off from work to which I've treated myself. I just mean that every moment I am reminded of her absence. Of the fact that I will never again hear her say, "Happy birthday, baby" after I say, "Happy birthday, Mom."

Never. That's a long time.

And she'll never see how well my life has turned out, how happy I am and what a wonderful husband I have. I think she would have loved his music. And him. She would have squeezed his knees at the dinner table and told him how handsome he is.

And it hurts to miss her just as much today as it did the day she died in 2003. I keep thinking it will get easier, but I don't know when.