Mabel by the numbers

In honour of my mother's birthday today, I'm going to go through her life by the numbers:

• 74: How old she would have been today
• 61: How old she was when she died
• 7: the number of her brothers and sisters: Jemmie, Charles, Bernice, Maud, Henry, ummm... dammit.
• 1: number of times I saw her skipping rope
• 104 (at least): number of times I went to her first to calm the waters before broaching something with my dad
• 10: number of dagger-like, perfectly manicured fingernails she always had
• 2: number of times (to my knowledge) she lied to my father's face to save my ass
• 15: number of years we've endured without her

A sidebar that I thought would be relevant for this post: Last week Audrey just out of the blue mentioned that when she's in a bad mood, she goes to our spare room where there is a nice painting of my mum and talks to it. They've never met. I love that she does that.

I'm thinking of you mum... and by the way, I found out that "jo" is a real and valid Scrabble word. So I apologise for all the ribbing I always gave you and I concede. You win.

kxx