Do you remember the summer we ...

Do you remember the summer we signed you up for camp? And the night before you left, you said you\'ve changed your mind and wanted to stay home? I told you to to get a seat on the left side of the bus, so when you pulled away, you\'d be able to look back and see me there waiting for you.\
Do you remember the summer we signed you up for camp? And the night before you left, you said you've changed your mind and wanted to stay home? I told you to to get a seat on the left side of the bus, so when you pulled away, you'd be able to look back and see me there waiting for you." I press her hand against my cheek, hard enough to leave a mark. "You get that same seat in Heaven. One where you can watch me, watching you.

Quotes from the same author

My mother... she is beautiful, softened at the edges and tempered with a spine of steel. I want to grow old and be like her.
The best place to cry is on a mother's arms.
I think this is every mother's worst nightmare - something dreadful happening to her child.
That's the strange thing about being a mother: until you have a baby, you don't even realize how much you were missing one
Maybe you had to leave in order to really miss a place; maybe you had to travel to figure out how beloved your starting point was... ...Parents aren't the people you come from. They're the people you want to be, when you grow up. I sat between my mother and my father, watching strangers on TV carry in Shaker rockers and dusty paintings and ancient beer tankards and cranberry glass dishes; people and their hidden treasures, who had to be told by experts that they'd taken something incredibly precious for granted.