My mother died at 9:35 on July 4th, as I stroked her cheek with my arms around her, and repeated the litany of love that we had been reciting over the last 36 hours. "I love you, Mom" as her breathing came at longer and longer intervals. "Lorraine loves you, Carla loves you, Rick loves you, Walter loves you," I intoned, "Nick, John, Elizabeth, Genevieve, Barbara, Flynn, Brad, we all love you Mom."
Filled with incredulity and awe that I was witnessing my mother's final moments of life, I said an approximation of the Anglican Prayer for the Dying, crying and holding the woman who had given me life 50 years earlier. Then she didn't take another breath.
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