We had a tense and rocky relationship as I came of age as a young gay teenager in a Christian household! We ever saw eye to eye and she thought It was her fault I was gay and she had to rectify the error - me! But she softened as only a mother can - and just as we began mending fences and I too started growing up and being less recalcitrant she fell ill. It brought us closer faster, but not close enough, nor fast enough nor LONG enough before she was snatched away. I’m left with ragged bittersweet memories as I try to make sense of the shifting sands beneath my feet and I miss her and regret so deeply the years I truly wasted in trying to establish an “identity” that in death is meaningless!!