Woman shares touching story about keeping her mother’s memory alive visiting her former home on Google Maps

A woman has shared a touching and unique story on social media about keeping her mother’s memory alive—by visiting her former home through Google Maps.

Sherri Turner, who goes by @STurner4077 on Twitter, took to the platform to tell her story in a series of tweets.

“I look at my mum’s old house on Google Maps Street View, the house where I grew up. It says ‘Image captured May 2009’. There is a light on in her bedroom. It is still her house, she is still alive, I am still visiting every few months on the train to Bodmin Parkway,” she said in her first tweet.

Turner then goes on to describe the scenery in more detail, saying that her mom’s “little pink car” would still be parked in the garage, but she would have “taken a taxi from the station” only to be met by her smiling and waving mother when she arrives.

“We will play Scrabble and watch Tipping Point, and there will have been no pandemic, no other deaths, no as-yet-undiscovered illnesses,” she said, in part.

Turner also says that she took a print image of the Google Maps image of the house with her mom’s bedroom light still on because “it won’t last forever” and that “there may be a light on in the window,” but it won’t be her mother.

Awww.

People in the comments were moved by Turner’s posts as they began to recount memories of their loved ones.

“Last sentence made me tear up. After my grandma died (it’s been many years now) I made the mistake of looking at the sales ad for her house. I broke down crying then, because it was her house, a house I visited so often since I was a small child, but now it was empty and cold,” wrote a commenter.

“This was so moving. I did this many times with my mum’s house, which was my childhood home, but the image has now changed. You don’t just grieve for [the] person you lose, but everything that goes with them, the past you had and the future you won’t get with them,” wrote another commenter.

A third commenter had advice about how to access the photos in the event that Google Maps does update to feature more current imagery and said the following:

“In case this does ever happen, just know google doesn’t delete the image - if you access Google Street View on a desktop, click the clock icon in the top left corner, and it lets you select from all the times their street view car went down the street over the years.”

The tweets have been liked over 9,500 times at the time of writing to which Turner said that her “mum would love that you are all reading about her x” as people reacted to her beautifully poignant story of her mom’s legacy and the fond memories they shared with one another.

And for that, messages like this will continue to touch the hearts of many.

Check out some other heartfelt responses below.