In Memory Of My Mom, Alice Donovan

Alice Louise Donovan

May 7, 1958 - November 14, 2002

Found January 17, 2009

Layed To Rest November 14, 2009

I am Alice Donovan's oldest daughter Angie..It has been a very long seven years. And as I stand here today, I can't believe that this day has finally come....The day that I have longed for, The day that I have dreamt of.. The day we could lay my mom, Alice to rest. The day everyone could come together and celebrate her life...
The life that she lived to the fullest and a life that she charished. She was full of life. She had a passion for life. She found beauty in everything that she touched. Whether it be a person or an object. She had a laugh that would tickle your soul. She had an embrace that always made you feel safe. She had a beauty that radiated from the inside out.. She was a woman with integrity. She's Alice Donovan a woman I am honored to say is my mother, my bestfriend, my confidant, and my hero...

Everytime I see her picture or hear her name my mind is flooded with memories and emotions..We shared many many memories and it would take me a lifetime to tell them all.


Mom loved many things and had many hobbys. She especially loved music and she loved to dance. As a child I remember her dancing to disco music. When she drove her car she would crank the radio loud and start singing along. She would say to me "Ange listen to the words, and listen to the beat". She even named me after the song "Angie" by the Rolling Stones. I remember a time when she used music to cheer me up..
It was the year of 1997, My sister and I made a trip to South Carolina for my 21st birthday to see our mom. On our last night I was feeling upset. I had just found out that I was pregnant with my first daughter and I was scared to death about becoming a mother. I was in her guest room laying on the bed crying when she came in to the room and asked me what was wrong. I told her that I was scared that I would not be a good mother and not sure if I could do it without her. She climbed on the bed and layed beside me, put her arm around me and began to cry with me. Through her tears she assured me that I would be a great mother and that I would do just fine without her. She hugged me tightly. She Got up off the bed and grabbed my hand and said come on. She led me into the living room where the song Hot, Hot, Hot by Buster Poindexter was blarring. She put my hands on her waist and called to my sister and everyone else and she lead us in the Conga around the rooms. She had the ability to change the moods of situations with the simplest gesture. And It was through my mom that I found the appreciation for music and how music can have an ever lasting effect on your memories in life.

She loved her grandchildren. She would play with them and laugh with them. She would teach them things of nature. She loved the outdoors.

Mom loved flowers. She loved to garden. Everywhere that we lived we had a flower bed or herb garden of some kind. Her house was always surrounded by the beauty of flowers. One day when I was a teenager I asked her why she always planted a flower bed in front of my bedroom window. She looked at me with this serious look on her face and said to me "Do you really think I am stupid? I know that you sneak out of your bedroom window at night. And Every morning when I leave for work I check the flower bed to see if you have climbed out the window. You leave your foot prints in the dirt. And In the evening when I am watering the flowers I clear your foot prints from the night before. That is how I know when your are sneaking out." She asked me what was so important that I had to sneak out of my window at night and put myself in danger for? I did not answer. She looked at me with concern in her eyes and said, "the beauty of these flowers are not ment to keep you confined but are there to keep you safe." And that she did. Always kept me safe. Kept me hidden away from the the darkness of evil that lurks in the shadows of life. She had a way of making places magical..

Places can be magic. Just like the Wizard Of Oz. She loved that movie. She would say to me "Angie there are life's lessons to be learned in that movie" And it was not until she was gone that I finally figured out the biggest lesson of them all..

" A heart is not judged by how much you love, but by how much you are loved by others"
The love for my mother will last a lifetime and beyond into eternity. Until we meet again, Goodbye.