Mum Had A Unique Capacity For Love

Jess Mills writes movingly on her mother, Labour MP Dame Tessa Jowell, who died of brain cancer on 12 May.

- Jess Mills

I KNEW, EVEN WHEN I was very little, how lucky I was to have her as my mum. Spending time with her was one of my favourite things: idling the hours away endlessly chatting, doing face masks, going for walks, cooking supper, or: ‘Darling – 2nd floor at Liberty’s? Let’s have some tea and the sales are on; I want to get you something lovely.’

Mum had a unique capacity for love – she was just passionate about strangers. It was how she transformed the world around her. It didn’t matter to her who you were, she saw a magic in people that they often didn’t know existed in themselves. And you just need to take what you know of her as a public servant and times that by infinity to understand how she loved her family: no matter how much she gave to so many others, she saved her best for us. Whatever the pressures of her job, she would always answer her phone, even if she did occasionally say in a hushed voice: ‘Sweetheart, I’m in Cabinet, is everything OK?’

The love between us came into soaring technicolour when my daughter was born. Morning rituals of FaceTime and lengthy conversations about how our night had been, how many times Ottie had fed or not, new expressions that had appeared overnight – all of which were observed by Mum as if she was witnessing for the first time the miracle of life itself.