The Shortest Journal Entry of Toby Moore

Monday, August 15th


My mom finally died. I don't mean to sound like I'm happy about it. I just feel numb. I was right there when that beeper thing stopped... beeping. Her chest stopped rising, instead sinking further down into her ribbed body. She looked peaceful when it happened. I guess that's the most anyone could ask for when someone close dies. I didn't cry though. I couldn't. I could see it happening, I knew what was going to happen, so I can't really blame it on shock.

Edith Moore was a good woman. A good widow, a good mother, a good Christian. She prayed many times a day once she found out her expected expiration date. It was as if she thought she could save her soul from paying for her life of indulgences by acting all pious. I didn't buy it, but hey, whatever made her happy.

If there's one thing I'll remember about Edith, mom, it'll be her eyes. Big blue oceans stuck in two wide white marbles. An oasis among the wrinkles of her sandy features. Many thought she was beautiful, but I didn't see it. I only saw her eyes, always mournful, mysterious, with a look that stings, no matter the occasion... I got my dad's brown eyes. Boring expressionless brown.

Dad. Where is he now? Would he care about mom's 'fate'? I'd like to think he would. Even among the numerous bad memories, there are speckles of good thoughts of their past together. Like when they gardened together every Sunday, all their problems were forgotten. I'd help them ready the earth for new seeds to be planted. I had no idea what I was doing and still don't, but mom and dad did. Its unfortunate that gardening was all they had going for them.

Sometimes I wonder if there was anything I could've done to stop Him from walking away. The man didn't even say so much as a goodbye as he walked out with his big black suitcase. My mom didn't cry, not after she heard the news of his absence, not when she heard that he remarried. At least, I never saw any tears.



I talked to Gabby a week before the death. I wonder sometimes where I'd be without her. I only knew her for a month, but she's helped me stay solid through this whole thing. The conversation we last had has been playing and replaying in my mind for days.

I asked her what her mom was like.

"A big teddy bear."

I smiled.

"What's the first present you remember from your mom?" She asked.

A bag of seeds, I told her. Lilac seeds.

"I'm guessing you were expecting more?"

No, I replied. She was always into nature stuff. But those lilac seeds... we planted them together. In our front yard. It was November. They never grew, even though we worked so hard, watering, checking up on them every morning. She kept telling me 'Don't worry, someday they'll grow.'

By then, though, I stopped listening to her.... I just turned up the volume on my ipod till I was out of high school.

Gabby looked me up in the eyes for a good solid minute before she spoke her words.

"Lilacs grow in the spring, Toby."



Maybe the reason I'm not as sad as people say I should be is that her death put a lot of thoughts in perspective for me. For instance, when I was leaving the hospital, I saw a painter out in the fields, with a completely blank canvas. He had so many colors on his palette, so many subjects to paint, but he didn't have a clue where to begin.

I feel like her death is like yet another blank canvas in my heart now, the frame of reference always there, but left for someone else to fill with their own colors.

People come and go in life, changing us forever. My mom made me who I am today. My Dad helped. She'll always be the frame to my heart, where others will paint their own influences from their moms, until we create one unified painting, one of hearts joined together, in mourning and remembrance of spring lilacs and wonderful love.

Here's to life and the seeds we tend.