Last night I dreamed of my mom. Those of you who know me, know my mom passed about eleven years ago, when she was only fifty.

In the dream she was cooking a large dinner for what appeared to be a dinner party, or a holiday. As the dinner was being presented, the people being served were complaining about this or that. I grew concerned about whether or not she was okay and went into the kitchen to see if I could help.

There she was. My mom. Exactly as my mom should be. Her curly hair was a little disheveled, her beautiful, soft skin, her eyebrows so perfectly plucked. I said to her, ‘Don’t you just get a burning livid feeling in your stomach?’ She said, as if so happy someone understood, ‘Yes!’ And she moved to embrace me. And she embraced me and it felt so good. And I thought, of course I understand now Mom, I understand so many things I never did before I had four children. And she was my friend.

People ask me if it was hard to lose her at such a young age. She was fifty and I was twenty five. Yes, yes of course it was. It was terrible to lose her. It was terrible to get the telephone call from my sister telling me she had finally passed away. I said that stupid thing people always say, ‘Oh, but I just talked to her yesterday.’ You’d think, as a writer, I could come up with something better.

She was no longer suffering, but my suffering had just begun.

There are the things I miss now. I miss being able to call her on the telephone and just talk. I miss listening to her crank up the television at the beginning of every Blazers game when they were introducing the players as she clapped and cheered. I miss the softness of her hair. I miss her laugh and the way she would take the rings off my fingers when I would visit and slip them on her own, keeping them for herself. I miss that I cannot call someone and say, ‘Mom, when I was a kid did I do this or that?’ because one of my kids is doing this or that. I miss being able to ask for her advice, and the infuriating way she would always play devil’s advocate. I miss my mom. I miss the person I could always fall back on, could always trust. I miss the one person in the world who would never, no way, abandon me or give up on me. I miss the one person in the world who could always find the good in me.

Maybe those are selfish reasons for missing someone. But I’ve never gotten over the fact that she was taken too young. That someone else could have been taken in her place. That here was a woman who was entirely good and fiercely loving.

My mom was the glue to our family. She was the sun that the four of her children orbited.

I look at us all now, and we’re just sort of drifting, looking for someone to replace her.

The problem is, she is irreplaceable.