Andrea O. Freeman

 This year I chose to devote some time focused on the Lent season leading up to Easter.  I honestly couldn't recall the last time I spent time focused on Lent and had to consider what it is and what it meant to me.   I understood it to be the time frame representing the 40 days that Jesus spent wandering in the wilderness before he began his public ministry.  I have heard over the years from friends choosing to give up or abstain from something in their lives to help them better focus and grow in their walk with the Lord.  I have done something similar at several points in my life over the years, but nothing really significant in terms of giving something up that wasn't material or tangible.  This year is different in one way in particular, the loss of my Mom in January.  I am coming up to a lot of first's without her, including Easter.  Easter holds a really special place in my life because it was during the Easter season in 1979 that I accepted Jesus into my heart and bec

 Early Tuesday morning January 2, 2024, I got a call that my Mom was slipping away and the family should come.  We knew she was not doing well these past couple of weeks as she had developed pneumonia and covid, and she was struggling just to manage breathing.   When I arrived, the nurse brought me in to Mom's bedside, and quietly stepped out to give me some time alone with her before my Dad and my brother arrived.   I cried like I have never cried before in my life, and went to my knees beside her, resting my hand on her arm.  I have no words to describe what it felt like in that moment, the finality and the reality of it.  My brain understood she was gone, no longer there.  But my heart, regardless of how far gone Mom had been for years now..... my heart was suddenly flooded with the feelings, the sounds, the memories of her across my entire life, rushing through my head in that moment all at once.  It felt like time kind of stopped, so I could have a moment to take it all in, co