Remembering Moma

My mother-in-law has been central to my life for many years, but last year, at age 99, she died.  She was full of grace to the very last as she had decided, with the help of hospice, to take herself off her heart medications.  Within days she died peacefully and in her own way.  She worked most of her life as a registered nurse and at the same time, taking care of my husband's brother who was born with a brain tumor.  He lived with cognitive and physical limitations until his death at age 27.  His caregiver for all those years had been my mother-in -law.

A few weeks before she died we had taken a photograph of her arm and hand.  A hand that had done so much in life.  This piece, The Last Letter, is inspired by that photograph and by a life fully lived.  I was close to this special woman, but there will always be many questions that will never be answered.

The pieces is made from white cotton and stuffed and then painted with gesso and mounted on a frame. The piece is now in the collection of a friend who has a website ReimagineAging.org