If you knew my mom, you know she was the life of the party, so it's fitting that her birthday was on the biggest party day of the year.
I'm not sure the exact year this photo was taken, but I know I was in middle school, because my mom fashioned my hair just like this when I went to MY biggest party of the year, a friend's bar mitzvah, to which my BFF Jessica and I had looked forward for MONTHS. Not only did I borrow the pictured hairdo but also (I think?) my mom's black leather skirt and silver blazer with giant shoulder pads. I had missed the memo that the other seventh graders would be wearing poofy-sleeved pastel floral dresses.
Having spent adolescence in constant mortification and befuddlement related to fashion, I'm still in awe of my mom, who I'm pretty sure never wasted a minute of her life on embarrassment.
Sadly, in recent years, she did not get to spend much time out in the world. Due to her failing health, she lived for the last six years with me in Houston, far from friends and family. But even in relative isolation, she managed to make friends wherever she went.
When she died, I desperately wanted to go home to Kansas and be around the people who knew and loved her. I'd actually hoped to be there today, for what would have been her birthday—but with much of our family spread across the country, we weren't able to arrange a wintertime memorial. I hope instead we'll be able to get together in the spring when the streets are snow-free. Margarita season was her favorite, after all. In the meantime, this site is her memorial, and I do hope you'll share your own stories and photos.