A look back in time!

I've been making a photographic picture book for my mother to celebrate her 70th Birthday, so my mind is pretty much occupied with images & thoughts of her.  Looking at her pictures throughout the different stages of her life leaves me in an emotional antithesis. She is the most amazing woman I know. She is the epitome of goodness and grace and I don't say this in a flippant way; I say this with great conviction.

Her fortitude in the face of hardship is what inspires me to keep trying at those times when I feel I have nothing left in the tank. She has experienced more pain, more adversity than most and she's dealt with it with such valor and grace. Adversity has never made itself a stranger to my mother and this is what I was referring to when I said I was in an emotional antithesis. 

Some adversities in life we may have an element of control over but there are some that just happen and you just have to rise up and meet the challenge. Mum has done that over and over and over again.  I pray that her hidden tears, her unshared worries and her magnanimous life can be spared from more of the same because she needs a break and by God does she deserve one!