We ambushed my mom with a surprise birthday party at the gym today; all of her fellow Silver Sneakers class members managed to keep a secret for two weeks (I’m glad I didn’t find out until this morning that they all knew, or I would have been losing sleep over it). It took for-ev-er for my mom to finally emerge from the locker rooms with my visiting Aunt Mimi; she was surprised and I detected a slight crack in her normally buoyant voice as she exclaimed over the cake and decorations in the gym’s expansive lobby.
Ah, yes, the decorations. I dug up some ancient family photo albums and found some great pictures of my mom, which I used to create a collage poster. Here are my two favorite images.
On the left, she’s standing in the backyard of our old house in Vancouver, B.C. My guess is that she’s 32 or 33 years old. On the right is her wedding photo; she’s wearing a traditional silk hand-embroidered gown that’s absolutely stunning to behold in person.
Happy birthday, Mom. I love you and thank you for everything you are to me.
