Today, May 9, is a very important day in my life. Today was a very important day in my Mom’s life, the most important day! She was born on December 31, but she considered May 9 her second birthday, the day she realized that she was alive, the day the world said farewell to armaments.
As a young woman during World War II, she carried soldiers from the battlefields in Russia. On May 9, 1945, someone handed her a bouquet of lilacs. From then on, there was always a bouquet of lilacs in her hands on May 9.
I hope she knows that today, May 9, 2013, there is a bouquet of lilacs near her tombstone at Union Cemetery in Columbus Ohio.
For me, my Mom will always be alive, and May 9 will always be celebrated with lilacs in her memory.