In ‘Nana Barbara,’ seeing my own mother

She cooked. She cleaned. She sewed and she welcomed whoever showed up at her doorstep. “Come in! Sit down. Are you hungry? Do you want something to eat?’’ she’d ask, no matter if there were a dozen mouths to feed.

This is what mothers did back then - this, plus a lot more. But I had a mother and all my friends had mothers, so she didn’t stand out.

Her eggnog, a Christmas Eve tradition, did. And the clothes she made, nicer than any you could buy. And the parties she threw; winter, summer, holidays, any day, there were so many parties. And her great, big, wonderful, constantly growing family.

But Barbara, herself, was just one in a long line of mothers who we believed were permanent fixtures in our lives. Always was and always would be there for our every need, our every complaint, our every worry, just a few miles or a phone call away.

But one by one, the mothers left us, my mother the first, a stunning thing. I was only 24 and I saw Barbara with new eyes after this. I saw all that she did for her family. And I saw the love that propelled her.

In many ways she reminded me of my mother. The way she got her hair done every week. The way she dressed up for church. The way she carried herself and laughed and was the life of a party. The way she smoked her cigarettes no matter what anyone said. The way she set a table. The way she baked. The way she used china cups for tea. The way she loved her baby sister. And the way her voice got a little softer whenever she talked about her husband and kids.

As I got older, I saw even more of my mother in Barbara. Wishful thinking, I suppose. Childish fantasy. But physically, they were alike. Plus, Barbara cared about me. And she loved my children, and then my children’s children unconditionally. “Nana Barbara,’’ they call her.

“Come in. Sit down. What can I get you?’’ This was her mantra all of her life. Followed by, “How are you?’’ And “What are you doing?’’ And “How is . . .’’ And on she’d go. This never changed. Never, not once, not even on a day when I stopped by and she was in real pain, her granddaughter Kerry taking care of her, did she say, “Woe is me.’’

It cannot have been easy to be the last man standing, the sole person left in the audience, everyone else gone home. It must have been hard, the living and the dying and the existing in between. But she did it, and she did it with a smile.

She buried her sister and her husband and so many good friends. She slowly lost her health. But still she remained an ardent fan of life and of family, cheering the younger generations on. Making it to the Cape this year, and even to her granddaughter Rachel’s wedding.

It is so hard to lose a mother no matter how old you are, no matter that your mother was suffering, no matter that she has family waiting on the other side.

It is so hard to lose someone who has been in your corner your whole life.

“I’m going home tomorrow,’’ she kept saying the night before she died. She was in the hospital. She’d had a bad day and her family had brought her there. Home, we thought, meant back to her house, so we smiled and agreed.

She smiled, too. And then she went about dying the way that she lived, without much fuss, taking her leave in the dark, shedding the body that held her here, leaving her seat in the audience for a place called home.

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This is an update on my Sept. 13 column about the Palermos, who have lost two of their three children to cystic fibrosis. A fund-raiser at Medfield High School raised more than $30,000 for a scholarship to be given each year to a graduating senior who exemplifies courage, determination, and hope.

Also, a private pilot from Cambridge has volunteered to fly Mark Palermo, the surviving child, to Cleveland for a lung transplant, when the Palermos get a call from the hospital. Now they are just waiting for a donor.