Tomorrow is November 11. Mum’s birthday. The first birthday without her.

Mum was very proud of her birth date. When asked for her birthdate, she would just rattle it off. She loved that it was a holiday — for her, growing up, it was Armistice Day, the anniversary of the day fighting stopped in World War I. I’ve read stories of the end of the war, how at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, the shooting stopped and troops on both sides, cautiously at first, and then joyously, came out of their trenches and embraced their former enemies.

The holiday became Veteran’s Day in 1954, and for a while, it was one of those moveable Monday holidays, but eventually, it returned to November 11th.

As for me, I’ll still be thinking of Mum. We met at the house today to try to figure out what to keep and what to leave for the liquidators. I’d never quite realized what a pack rat she’d become in her later years until I was responsible for dusting all her teapots, and today, going through all her old papers to figure out what to keep and what we could get rid of. She still had old bills from the 1960s in her files.

Birthdays and anniversaries are times for celebrations — until the person you’re celebrating isn’t around anymore. Then they become times to remember. Seems like I’m celebrating less and remembering more as time goes on. Tomorrow, I’ll be remembering Mum.