The text from my brother was brief. “I’m going to be at Disney World with Hannah and a few of her friends from April 1-5. You’re going there too, right?” I was delighted by his unexpected news. Two months earlier, I had booked a three-day vacation in Disney World for my son and me, with plans to be there from April 4-6. It would fall during our first visit to see my father in the United States since my mother had passed away the previous year, and I knew our trip would be fraught with mixed emotions. Orlando was less than a two-hour drive from the independent living facility that my father had moved into shortly after my mother’s death, and I liked the idea of breaking up our stay with a few days in the magical world of Disney. As a bonus, I was able to use points I’d accrued on my credit card to cover a significant portion of our booking costs, allowing us to choose a hotel we might not have selected otherwise.
I quickly texted back to let him know our dates, and added that we’d be staying onsite at the Disney Pop Century Resort. His answer surprised me. “So are we,” he responded, and asked if Yogev and I could arrive a day earlier so that we could spend more time together. I contacted the hotel and successfully changed our reservation, all the while marveling at this unforeseen turn of events.
When I told my father that Josh and I would be meeting up in Disney World, he was ecstatic. He recounted his and my mother’s fear that my brother and I would lose our connection once they were both gone, and was thrilled that we were seizing this opportunity to vacation together with our children. His voice choked up as he spoke of my mother and how happy it would have made her to know that we were doing this, and it was something I’d also thought about. My brother and I got along well when we visited, but we didn’t speak often and saw one another even less. In the days before our mother died, though, we managed to connect on a level that had eluded us for years – a connection that deepened as our family dynamic turned upside down while we faced our mother’s illnesses and subsequent death.
My brother and I made restaurant reservations and park plans, rearranging schedules as needed to maximize our time together. I was excited at the prospect of having fun with my brother, and looked forward to Yogev and Hannah having this rare opportunity to hang out. Despite their two-year age difference and the miles that separated them, they enjoyed each other’s company and I wanted them to develop their relationship even further. They hadn’t seen one another since the days surrounding my mother’s funeral, keeping each other company during the day and sleeping on matching sofas in my parents’ living room at night. I loved the idea of us wandering around Disney World with my brother and one of my nieces; I loved the idea of us making memories together.
But even as my excitement grew, like my father, I was deeply saddened by the fact that my mother wasn’t alive to witness what was happening. I, too, knew how happy it would have made her to see her children and grandchildren planning and taking a trip together. My grief over her loss was palpable and still felt fresh; knowing that she was missing it all made my heart ache and filled my eyes with tears.
And yet, I couldn’t help but wonder if my mother somehow had a spiritual hand in bringing my brother and me together in this way. After all, what were the chances that Josh and I – completely independently of one another – would make plans to be in Disney World at the same time AND choose to stay at the same hotel (out of the hundreds of hotels in and around Orlando), especially when our hotel preferences and vacation destinations usually took us in wildly different directions? Was this my mother’s doing, laying the logistical groundwork (after all, she’d always been very practical and meticulous when it came to travel plans) to ensure that our paths would be able to cross?
I didn’t know what to think. I wanted – perhaps even desperately needed – to believe that our mother had been the guiding force, that she was watching over us from wherever she was, doing her best to help us celebrate our sibling relationship. I was utterly devastated by her death and I missed her terribly, and the idea that she was somehow responsible for bringing us together was soothing. On the other hand, the cynic in me was skeptical, unwilling to accept the possibility that what had happened was nothing more than an incredibly wonderful twist of fate. I would never be able to find any concrete proof of her involvement, and felt shaky and uncertain about making such a leap of faith.
As the date of our trip drew closer, my mother was a constant, bittersweet presence in both my head and heart. My life experiences were rich with unexpected, meaningful coincidences that piqued my curiosity and sparked an openness for exploring my own spirituality, and I embraced those quirky moments of happenstance whenever they occurred. But bumping into or hearing from people after suddenly thinking about them was one thing – trying to get my head around my mother acting as my travel agent a year after she’d passed away was quite another.
My friends were more confident than I was. “It does sound like something your mom would help to orchestrate,” noted Sheri, one of my oldest friends who had known my mother since we were kids. “You know she did,” exclaimed Denise, whose wisdom and friendship during the previous year had been a lifeline when my grief was overwhelming and I needed a confidant. My friend Debbie called it “mom serendipity” – a term that brought a smile to my face.
With so many comments of a similar nature pouring in, I found it easier to put my faith in the feelings I felt in my heart. I allowed myself to accept the possibility that my mother – who desperately wanted to ensure that my brother and I nurtured and enjoyed our relationship – had intervened to create this unexpected family reunion. I liked what my friend Roni had to say. “It doesn’t matter what the situation is. If you felt that your mother was there and helped you, then she was! Your mother is always with you,” she said with certainty.
And my mother was clearly with us as we traveled, hovering in our thoughts as we stopped for lunch at her favorite roadside restaurant chain on the way to Orlando. I felt her with me when I hugged my brother in the hotel lobby and as we watched the sunset from the balcony outside of our room. Perhaps we couldn’t see or touch her, but my mother was definitely with us in Disney World, and the one thing I knew for certain was that she was happy.
*This story appears in Chicken Soup for the Soul: My Amazing Mom: 101 Stories of Love and Appreciation
