I shuddered when I saw my Mom’s photograph.  As far as I can tell it was a photograph taken in the cemetery when my father died.  She was this grim looking woman who had a long brimmed black hat on and steadied herself with a cane.  When I viewed this photograph again, she had been dead nine years.  I had forgotten about her.  How crazy she really was.  She tried to control Dad with all her illnesses she was always complaining about.  He resisted this.  She was hard to get away from.  When I was a child and young adult, I had no choice.  I could not get away from her.  Her fears and anxieties ran her life and those around her.  I had forgotten her and how nuts she truly was and how incredibly controlling she was.  And she was viewed sane.  I saw this first hand.  The photograph of her brought back all these negative feelings about her.  It is a terrible thing to say:  she was my Mother but part of me was glad to get rid of her.  There is so much, though, you can discard.  I can only escape her to a certain degree.  I know part of her is in me.  And I am aware I still owed her a debt.  There were traits she transmitted to me I am glad to have.  It took a long time to shed parts of her I wanted to.  And some I never will.