From JuJu with Love

When I think about my mom, I often think about how strong and generous she was. But just as important — and maybe my favorite part — is how much we laughed together.

Some of my best memories of her are just the two of us cracking up over everyday chaos.

One time I flew down to Boca to visit her, and as soon as I arrived, she insisted on taking me grocery shopping so we’d have all my favorite things in the house for the week.

We went to King’s Market, a small specialty market near her — not the big Publix, but a little neighborhood place — and filled our cart with everything we wanted. Then we turned away for a minute to look at the fish counter and ordered what we needed for dinner.

When we turned back around, our shopping cart was gone.

Not stolen — just gone.

Some other shopper had clearly grabbed the wrong cart and wandered off with all our groceries.

Instead of being annoyed, we started laughing. And once we started, we couldn’t stop. Right there in the middle of the store, laughing so hard I thought I might actually pee my pants.

We had to start all over again, still giggling as we refilled the cart.

Another time, on a different Florida visit, we went to see my grandparents. My grandfather, trying to be a helpful husband, noticed my grandmother had a long nose hair and decided he was going to trim it for her.

With scissors.

Instead of neatly trimming it, he accidentally nicked her nose.

My grandmother was screaming, my grandfather was running around apologizing, and my mom and I were doubled over laughing so hard we could barely breathe. The more chaotic it got, the harder we laughed.

And then there was the afternoon by the pool when I tried to teach my mom how to take a selfie.

This was before smartphones, so we were using a regular camera, and she just couldn’t understand how to hold it or where to look. And she wouldn’t stop talking while I was trying to get the picture lined up.

One thing led to another, and suddenly we were both laughing so hard we couldn’t even pose. Tears streaming down our faces, gasping for air, unable to compose ourselves long enough to take a normal picture.

When I eventually got the photos developed, they were exactly what you’d expect — half our faces in the frame, half out, goofy faces from crying with laughter, blurry shots from shaking hands.

Completely imperfect.

And completely perfect.

Looking back now, those are the moments I treasure just as much as the big milestones — the simple, ridiculous moments when life surprised us and all we could do was laugh together.

And honestly, I think that laughter carried us through a lot of harder days too.

And one more thing about my mom — no matter what hospital she was in or what condition she was in, she was still trying to take care of me.

She was in and out of hospitals more times than I can count. Sometimes for long stays, sometimes just a few days. But every time a doctor walked into the room, at some point the conversation would somehow turn to me.

“Julie’s single,” she’d say.

Or, “Do you have any nice single friends?”

Or she’d look at me and say, “This is my daughter.”

It didn’t matter that she was the one in the hospital bed. She was still trying to fix me up.

Even when she was sick, she was still being my mom.

And honestly, thinking about it now still makes me smile.

From Juju with love 💙