An ordinary life by an extraordinary woman

We did not hold a funeral in Florida where my stepmom died. I am in Switzerland with her granddaughter, and her grandson is in California.

We had cared for her with help from others long distance for almost three years sometimes sharing the next steps in daily crisises, at other times a few days or even a week would go by when there were no problems all we needed to do was talk with her.

My stepmom had been raised Catholic but left the church when as a divorced woman she married my dad, a divorced man. After he died, she went back to the church. I was with her the day she first took communion and saw how at peace she was with herself now that she'd made peace with her God.

My lack of religion does not negate my respect for her beliefs. We made sure she had the last rites.

In Geneva there is an anglophone Catholic church and the priest there suggested a mass to pray for her soul. That was last night in a very intimate chapel not far from where I used to work.

He asked me to tell him about her. 

I did citing her service in WWII, her losing a daughter and the disappearance of a son. I told him how much I loved her and how the closest thing we ever had to an argument in all the decades I knew her was her wish I'd let the iron cool before putting it away. I told of the friends who visited her regularly as her mind wandered further from us, but how she never lost her sweetness.

I told him she didn't have a copy of The Ugly Stepmother's Manual, which was a joke she and I shared. I didn't tell him she was a card shark but not for money unless it was for the dime a game she or my dad anted up when either lost to gin rummy. Their winnings paid for their holidays.

Before the mass, he came and asked if were the Nelsons. I said yes. He smiled. "I wanted to make sure you were here," he said.

The chapel is tiny. Cement on one side, wood on another. Candles flickered in red glasses to our right.

The service began with the bells.

The priest talked about my mom citing some of the things I told him, but he framed it that some people live ordinary lives in extraordinary ways and the love that she generated was extraordinary.

I reached for my daughter's hand. My daughter found tissues for us both.

After the mass, as my daughter added one more flickering candle to those already lit as I thanked the priest for his kindness and his words that captured my mom's spirit.

"When you talked to me about her," he said, "You really touched me. There seemed to be so much love in her that I felt she was really an extraordinary woman."

She was.