It was a day I had dreaded for the past six years.  Let me back up a little…  six years ago I was in a waiting room in Mobile, Alabama with my father while my mother was having cataract surgery…. He shared with me something that he had been keeping a secret…  He confided that my mother was forgetting recipes that she had made all of her life.  She was having trouble managing schedules and commitments….  His voice trailed as he choked back tears….  

Fast forward six years….  My mother and I took a day trip from Brewton to Birmingham.  It was not a day for shopping as we had done so many times before.  It was not a day to meet a friend or celebrate a birthday.  It was a day to meet a stranger who would ask my dear, sweet mother questions….   “What is today’s date?”, “Who is the current president of the United States?”  “Can you draw a picture of a clock?”…  It was a day that this stranger would look at an MRI of my mother’s brain and tell me that she was suffering from a terrible disease that was slowly stealing my mother away from me and reversing our roles as mother and daughter.  

I had been preparing for this day for six years…  six long years in which so much had changed… Yet…. to look at my mother, she still looked beautiful.  She still seemed healthy.   She was still smiling and appeared hopeful.  Yet this thief…. had already taken so much…. what more could he, or would he take?  How much would he steal from her life and her family’s life?

But in talking to the stranger, also known as a “neurologist”,…. he asked about my mother’s everyday life.  I told him she does word puzzles and watches Wheel of Fortune on TV.  We go for long walks and talk about the beauty of nature. We go to church and read the Word. We watch for deer as we drive through our neighborhood.  We have family meals and go out to eat in restaurants.  We shop for deals at the local thrift store.  And this stranger who became a friend that day said something I’ll never forget.  He said, “Keep doing!  The doing is more important than the remembering.”

I hung onto those words….  and I realized something else that day.  I realized that I had a choice to make. I could choose to give up and stop living…. OR I could embrace these words and keep doing, keep living, and even though my mother couldn’t remember, I could remember.  I could make new memories with my mother that I would remember, and she could “keep doing!”

Instead of driving back home in misery and sadness, I decided to embrace the time with my mother.  As we drove south on I-65, I turned the radio to a contemporary Christian radio station.  I sang the words out loud!  The words had renewed meaning in my life.  I wasn’t just singing. It was a heart cry of praise to the Lord.  

And you know what else I did….  I took the exit at Clanton, Alabama, and pulled the car into Peach Park.  Yes, we were going to have us a Peach Cobbler with ice cream on top! And you know something…. it was the best Peach Cobbler with ice cream that I have ever eaten!  And I believe it was the best Peach Cobbler that my mother has ever eaten – even if she doesn’t remember.

SAMPLING THE SOUTH…. it’s not just for the good days!