This week has been very emotional. My lifelong friend Nikki lost her mom Cindy to cancer on Thursday. The death of a parent never comes easy whether it be a long fight or quick loss and the sting of Cindy's unexpected death is hard to describe.
I really struggled when I left Carmi today after the funeral...feeling I wish I could stay and do more. On my long, solo ride home, I had a lot of time to reflect on some of the fun memories. Some of the details may be a little fuzzy and skewed to my view of the stories but I had to share.
- Nikki's mom was one of the cool mom's. I never even thought about it until today but now I realize it was because she was younger than lots of the other mom's. WAY younger than my mom...18 years younger. No wonder I thought she was cool!
- Cindy always let us do fun stuff. Slumber parties with like 50 girls with prank calls and bra feezing events. Chaperoning all night skate parties at The Roller Kingdom when all the other parents were fast asleep. Being the concert taxi mom and taking us in her fancy Buick Riviera which I remember calling the Rivvie.
- She took a load of us to Newburgh to see the movie Purple Rain. I remember my mom telling me "you can go to the movie with Cindy as long as you don't go see that Prince movie" ----oopsie.
- Laura Beth. 99% of people from Carmi either go by first and middle name OR have a nickname. Laura Beth, Jimmy Chuck, Danny Wayne, Nikki Sue, Spareribs, Pixie, Gravy, The Brother. I could go ON and ON. Cindy, Mimi, my Aunt Norma and Barb Childress were about the only people who continued to call me Laura Beth into adulthood. And when any of the 4 of them did it, it didn't seem odd in any way but when anyone else calls me that, it feels weird.
- She took is to Baynum's shoe shopping and to see the monkey purchasing Famolare dress shoes and Nike tennis shoes (red, white and blue ones!)
- Once during a motorcycle trip to Gatlinburg, all other 20 or so people took their Suzuki Calvalcade's but once again, Cindy loaded some of us up in the Rivvie and took us for a long week-end of fun. She let us listen to cassette tapes REALLY LOUD and talk on the CB radio.
- Sherri, Nikki and I went to St. Louis with Cindy for a summer trip and she let us order Strawberry Daquiri's. We were about 15 at the time and we swore the waiter added rum into them because he thought we were 21. We all three had braces on our teeth (compliments of Dr. Willis) so I am guessing there was no rum but Cindy let us go on thinking it like we were hot stuff!
Today, as we said our good-byes and sat quietly listening to Father Steve give her eulogy, he asked God to forgive Cindy of her sins. And I quietly leaned over to Donna Pabst and said "we wouldn't want to do that---the sins were what made Cindy FUN!"
Rest in peace Cindy ----and thank you for being the cool mom...
When it was time for Sean to move from a toddler bed to a twin, my friend Mary trekked with me to IKEA in Chicago to purchase a fun convertible bunk bed for him. At the time, he wasn't old enough to be on the top bunk, so we left it flipped so that it was like a twin bed with canopy railings. Thursday night, Jeff and I pulled everything off it, put the ladder on it, purchased another twin mattress and bedding and FLIPPED it over. Sean now calls it BUNK....not bunk beds....just BUNK. 
