Portrait of my Mother as a Young Woman

I think my mother is 19 or maybe 20 in this photo.

Not much younger than that, and not much older, as I was born a week before her 21st birthday, and there's no sign of me to be found in this photo.
Today it is 11 years since she died. Very suddenly from a coronary thrombosis at the age of 45.
It is one of those days you will never forget, while never really remember.
I remember a three hours train ride crying the whole way, when not holding my breath, making an odd bet that if I could hold my breath until past that tree or that house or the next station or while counting to a mad number, then she would have woken up when I arrived, and it was all just a mistake or a bad joke.
Or a bad dream.
But it was not. And she didn't wake up.
I remember spending an entire afternoon ironing the white silk pajamas, I gave her for Christmas, wanting her to wear it in the coffin. The ironing board being my safe, quiet place away from my stepfather and my evil stepsisters.
I remember being angry and heartbroken.
And I stayed angry and heartbroken for a very long time.
But today, so many years after, that raw - and then not so raw - cold, hard, numbing grief has gone, and what I remember most today is her love.
The completely unconditional all-accepting love.
And her dry, dark sense of humour.
The bad elephant jokes, and our making stories together from everything and anything, be it a hardware store catalogue or a man driving past, there was always a story to be found.
She loved cats (and dogs), and wanted two Siamese cats. I thought she was silly and then forgot until I had my own set.
I remember her hands. And her laughter.
I know she was not perfect, but she was all and more than I could ever have asked for.
And I miss her.
I still miss her.
And I still love her.