for the three of you who read this

in honor of Mother's Day, I am reprinting something I posted at Columbina's Blog , which is involved in a fundraising campaign. Please go and leave your comments on that site.

My parents sadly died before I ever got the chance to know them as actual people, rather than just "parents": perhaps that is why I remember those scents so much; Mom's Joy as she leaned in to kiss me goodnight before going out to a dinner party; her blue-black hair, white skin and light green eyes (I got the latter two, as well as a disturbing resemblance to Joan Crawford), or Dad's Kolnisch Juchten and pipe (tobacco). I can still remember watching Some idiotic scary movie with him as a kid and hiding in his blazer, and the smell of that cologne with Dunhill London Mixture and Harris tweed. I still have one of those coats, and at 6'2", I don't fill it out.

Mind you, I'm not bitter, or even terribly sad about it. It's just the way things have worked out. But for anyone who may be reading this and have parents who are still around, I hope that this weekend (and Dad's weekend in June) that you will take a moment to inwardly thank whomever that you have a parent to love, live with, or even be annoyed by.