Happy Mother's Day Mini-me. You complete me.

It seems as though 10 years should be long enough to mourn. Long enough to lessen the feeling of loss. Long enough to stop thinking of someone almost, if not every, day. But it's not. Not in my experience. But that is not really about the loss. It is about the love.

I loved Dead Rita so richly, so completely, so well. And she returned the favor. I loved Mr. Papa also very deeply….but he has only been gone a bit over two years and he is not present with me the way she continues to be. And those are just the facts.

When Dr. Evil looks at Mini-me and says, "Mini-me, you complete me" in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me (1999) I laugh out loud. No surprise. I live out loud. And in that silliness of that line, I realize Dead Rita was my Mini-me – she completed me.

And I am not alone in feeling completed by another human being. That is just what happens when any two people are simpatico. That is just the easiest of relationships in our lives. But by far not the only one or sometimes even what we need. I would guess if I needed Dead Rita to be alive, she wouldn't be dead. And then I wouldn't be calling her Dead Rita. (and Live Rita's Wisdom just wouldn't be as interesting!)

I think of Mother's Day in a selfish manner. No Mother to celebrate and cherish. As a stepmother, it's always been a hard day. Some of my kids remember me on that day, others don't. And that is truly ok. I'm not their mom. I am their stepmother. And I have loved them all deeply for 27 years. They know that. They know that I know they know that. And that's good enough for me. Yet I look for deeper meaning in this life.

Then last night my perspective was once more broadened and I am richer for it.

Last night I heard Stephen Lewis, former Canadian Ambassador and UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa. He founded and is now working for an international advocacy agency organization, AIDS-Free World. The subject was the AIDS pandemic and its truly unspeakable and unbelievable affect on the children of Africa. About the strain children in Africa often feel to survive. About the daily challenges of living that we as Americans can rarely, if ever, imagine. About how a child In Africa struggles to understand how their mother could die before their eyes from the ravages of AIDS. And they may be the only one to see it or care. The facts and figures of this work cannot be written here….it's too much. But we must become aware of how there is a subterranean racism that allows the world to turn its back on AIDS in Africa – and yet we can afford to spend billions on a war in Iraq. Become more educated by looking at Stephen Lewis' site: http://aids-freeworld.org/

And what does this have to do with my Mother's Day message? Everything. All of us become children once again when our Mother dies. Sometimes for a moment, sometimes for a lifetime. Grief is so personal. So private. And yet we feel another's pain if we are watching with our soul. I listened last night with my soul. I felt the grief of a child losing their mother that didn't have to be. That a motherless child is never the same. We must look at what is happening around the world with the AIDS pandemic, especially in Africa and choose to do more. It is our responsibility and our ability that will lead to answers. Don't wait for governments or celebrities to fix this. You choose to help, in any way you find most empowering.

To any of you who read this and are now a motherless child, you are acknowledged. If your mother completed you, how fortunate you are. If you are completed by another person living or dead, be wise to that. And if you have not had that experience of being completed by another, consider that you may complete someone else through who you are to them.

Happy Mother's Day, to the mothered and the motherless.