Happy Mother's Day!

Like Earth Day, Mother’s Day should be celebrated everyday. It’s still nice for moms everywhere to be recognised and given a little TLC tomorrow, unless of course you’re a cloan of Joan (Mommy Dearest)

ah, what the heck, even Joan needs a little love.

Whether it’s giving Mom the traditional card, candy and flowers or throwing a big BBQ bash in her honor, remember to always appreciate your mom for she has:

brought you into this world, changed your diapers, fed, clothed, bathed, sheltered you...and then you started growing up before her very eyes...funny how she has always stayed the same.

Well, kinda.

It wasn’t until a few years ago that I learned that my mom is an actual human! She might run the household, tend to her children, pay the bills, work and bake brownies, but she still struggles and faces her own challenges.

She took me to appointments, picked me up, carted me and my friends around to each other’s houses and to the movies, watched all of my dance recitals and sat through endless performances from the living room couch, admitted to me when she didn’t understand my homework and wrote a note to the teacher that she was confused too,  walked with me on Saturday mornings up and down Glenview Road, sat me down when I was in the tenth grade and gave me a talk about respecting myself when it came to dating, helped me memorize my multiplication tables until we were both sleepy, showed me how to put on make-up, when other mothers bragged about their kids and mine kept quiet, I asked her why she didn’t speak up about us? She didn’t have to, she said. She knew her children...she didn’t have to talk about us to be proud. We always knew how proud we made her...even when I brought home a D in math because “I gave it my best effort and that is all anyone can ask.”

she took me to the library and was the first person who introduced me to reading, she helped me fill out my college paperwork and freshman year picked me up at 3 in the morning because I had mono, she made me write and sign a note when I was in the six grade that a boy would never take me to the dance (this note is sitting on top of my wedding things), took me to Dairy Queen after softball games, took me out to lunch when I got my period to celebrate (still a good memory, mom), prayed a little harder everytime I left the house when I first started driving, in high school she cut articles about drunk driving and left them on my bed, in college she sent me articles about the date rape drug, she knew when I was lying, she knew when I was in love, she told me that no matter what I could talk to her and she wouldn’t judge, she helped me pick out my prom dress and wiped away happy tears as I tried on my wedding dress for the first time

This list could go on, but I have to go wrap her presents and try not to eat her chocolate. Knowing her, she will share and I will say, “no, Mom – that’s for you.”

Happy Mother’s Day to everyone! Enjoy your special day and your everyday together...and for those of us who aren’t moms yet, thank you for giving us great examples of the kind of mothers we want to be in time to come.