Mother's Closet

I remember that closet. It was a freestanding closet with two doors. The left side had shelves and the right side had a rack for hanging clothes. It locked and my mother kept the key. She carried it in her apron pocket; if we needed anything we had to ask and then she would retrieve it.
The closet was not very big, but it had everything in it: our clothes, bed sheets, pillow cases, towels, washcloths, shoes, scarves, doilies, candy, and who knows what else.
As a child, I noticed how much time my mother spent at the closet. She was constantly arranging and rearranging its contents. She would sit on a chair in front of the closet and take out the sheets and rearrange them with the sweaters; she would refold the towels; she would take everything out and put everything back in. Soon, she would do it all over again.
I was born in Germany and when I turned 19 I moved to the United States where I got married. I never really thought about that closet again until many years later.
I was driving home from work one night in San Diego and was listening to one of my favorite pastors. He was talking about prayer and how we can ask God to allow us to see a person through the eyes of Jesus. It made me think about my mother.
When I left home, I was still a rebellious teenager and the many years separated from my mother did not allow us to build a close relationship. My visits home where always short and busy.
As I was driving, I was thinking how sad that was because my mother was now almost 90 years old. We did spend time every week talking on the phone. She loved telling me stories about the war, her childhood, and her escape from Prussia during WWII with my brothers and sisters. I always enjoyed hearing these stories.
As I continued home, I started praying to God and told Him about my mom and that I never really understood her. As I was praying, I realized I had been a very selfish teenager and had never taken an interest in getting to know my mom. I had dreams and they were all I focused on. My trips home were always about visiting with old friends and buying things I couldn’t get in the States. My mom waited on me hand and foot, and later also on my children when I brought them along. My heart was breaking as God showed me the selfish condition of my heart.
Suddenly, I saw a vision of my mom’s closet and the Lord showed me its real contents. There under all the things were the emotions she had collected over the years. I guess she did not know how to handle them. She just arranged and rearranged them in that closet and then locked them up once more.
There in the pockets of clothing were her fears; fears as she narrowly escaped the bombs as she was dragging five children towards safety. Fears for my father’s safety as well when he was stationed in Africa during WWII.
Tucked under the bed sheets were the dreams she had for my two brothers who died in infancy. My sister’s twin died of a stomach disorder and my other little brother died of pneumonia. My mother would also never see her only brother again. He died right after the war, a “mysterious” death.
Inside the pillowcases she hid her memories of the home she had to leave in Prussia when she had to pick up my brothers and sisters to escape from the approaching Russians.
Under the towels I saw where she hid her anger when my father would come home drunk from work each day. As she lifted the washcloths, her tears of loneliness fell to the ground as one daughter after another moved to America, leaving a big ocean between them.
At the bottom of the closet, the shoes were lined up neatly. They had never taken her to nice places, or on a well deserved vacation. Mother had a lot of memories bundled up in the scarves. There were the memories of her father and mother who both died when she was just a little girl. The doilies were all stuffed with the pretty things she never had and those she gave up because she gave them to us children instead.
And there in the corner were a few candies left. Those were the happy moments of her life. The rest of them she shared with us, her children and grandchildren when we would come to visit her.
When I got home that night, I told my husband that we needed to go visit my mom. A few months later, we flew to Germany. We devoted all the time to just be with her. For the first time, I was able to tell my mom that I loved her and she told me she loved me. She was not able to go anywhere with us because she could not walk, so we just watched TV and talked a lot.
When I left, I knew that our relationship had been healed. God had opened my eyes and I was able to see her through the eyes of Jesus. Seven months later, my mom passed away. She is with Jesus now and I am so happy to say that I know I will see her again someday.