Missing My Mom

The other day, I was blessed with the friendship of a wonderful lady who has recently been given one of God's most difficult challenges.  She lost her son, her little boy of only 27 years of age, to cancer.  Her story literally stabbed me in a very tender place, and I felt so very sad and helpless as she is trying ever so hard to come to grips with it all.  We are all here because we are grieving for someone very, very close to us, and I am here because I realized that not only am I grieving the loss of my wife, I am still grieving the losses of many, too many, members of my family, and I grieve in a different way for each of them.  Why?  It's really pretty simple, yet intensely complicated all the same.  Each of my dead family members played a different role in my life.  My Father.  My Mother.  My Brother.  My Grampa.  The list seems endless to me.  But I have never faced the loss of my child.  And the notion of that just scares the hell out of me.  My daughter, Jennifer, is my only child and, well, I can't talk about the pain should the unthinkable happen, so I won't even go there.  But this poor woman is at a place that I fear, and her story has triggered in me some thoughts about my own Mother that I want to share with and get in touch with for myself, in the hopes that it may help us both. 
Corinne LaVanche Manzer was born on October 8, 1925 in Norfolk, Nebraska.  She and her family moved to Southern California when she was a child and she grew up there.  She married Richard White on November 22, 1942 and together, they had three sons, Richard, Jr., Thomas, and Joseph, yours truly, the youngest of the three brothers.
I never knew her as "Corinne".  She was my Mom.  And she always will be.  My Mom was also my best friend.  Although boys tend to gravitate towards their fathers, my two older brothers had pretty much taken him over, and my sensitive nature seemed to blend with hers much more easily for me.  I never, ever doubted her love or devotion to me.  She made that very, very clear to me.
While I could write a book about my Mom, I want to talk about just two aspects of our relationship that I hold in my heart and carry in my very soul.  My mother was an alcoholic.  So am I.  She never sought treatment; she never hit bottom; she never really was "that kind" of an alcoholic, but she was one.  We used to sit up late at night after family celebrations or holidays or just for the hell of it.  I'd drink my beer, and she her "Jim Beam".
We would talk small talk and the conversation would then turn quite philosophical and spiritual.  We learned much about each other with the help of the booze "loosening up" any reservations about honesty that we held.  Often were the times that the subject turned to that of death and dying.  We would speak of those we had lost and we would "future trip" about our fates and what our own futures would bring.  Whenever I spoke of my own death, Mom would become emotional.  She would tell me that she did not want to even consider the thought of losing me, or either of my other brothers.  I remember asking her why.  She would have tears in her eyes and she would hug me and say, "I can't live without my boys.  I can't live with the pain.  I just can't.  I'm going to go first and that's all there is to it".  While those words were not particularly eloquent, and really didn't answer the question from a technical stand point, her answer was profound.  We were her world.  Period.  I always hugged her back, told her I loved her, and cried with her as we held one another. 
As a young man in my 20s, we used to take the "gamblers special" busses to the wickedly fun places like Reno & Lake Tahoe, with the goal of winning the "big one", having some drinks, and just being together.  We made quite a sight.  I remember us joking with each other of how the other passengers on the bus were thinking of us as a couple, she guilty of "robbing the cradle" and me as some kind of gigolo.  We laughed our butts off.  Were were having fun, and it was pretty obvious that there was love there.  Hanging out with her, and just learning to be a friend with her was a blessing I am very lucky to have received.  I could tell my Mom anything, and she always understood me and loved me unconditionally.  We were buddies. 
On August 9, 1985, my best friend got her wish.  She lost her life, along with her husband of 43 years, my Father, in an airplane accident near Rawlins, Wyoming.  She did not have to bear the loss of her middle son, my brother, Thom, a few years later.  God spared her that pain.
My Mom, my best friend, has been gone for 25 years 1 month and 6 days now.  But who's countin?.....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDzNAxpOaYo&feature=related