Motherhood
may be wonderful, heart-warming and all the other fuzzy adjectives we hear this
time of year, but it can also be downright humbling. There’s nothing like a kid or two (or four,
in my case), to remind you that just around the corner from a pink card telling
you how great you are, is a pink note from the teacher asking for a conference. Heaven forbid we should actually believe the
sentiments in a Mother’s Day card.
There’s no
one quite like you reminds me of the time I had transferred Cassidy to another
school, then mistakenly called his old school and asked to get a message to
him.
“Uh,
Cassidy doesn’t go here anymore,” the secretary said. Now, she has to keep track of, what—500
kids? And I have to keep track of
four? Yet I cannot remember that I HAVE
PUT MY CHILD IN ANOTHER SCHOOL? I’ll bet
they still laugh over that one in their faculty meetings.
Tears of joy reminds me of the time, in church, when
Nicole whispered to me, “Why are you crying?” and I had to turn and whisper
back, “Those aren’t tears. That’s
sweat.” Peri-menopause does not go well
with pantyhose and a hot chapel.
I know I
haven’t thanked you enough reminds me of the time Brandon asked me to come
outside, only to discover an irate airport driver whose van was just hit with a
water balloon launched by my very own son.
Oh—and the driver was from Lebanon and thought it was a car bomb.
You’ve
always been there for me reminds me of the time the Vice Principal called me in
to explain the school’s tardy policies, and that even if a child has graduated
early, and is just coming back for auto shop to work on his Mustang, he cannot
accumulate 100 (yes, one hundred) tardies.
This resulted in a rewrite of the school’s handbook.
Your
tender love reminds me of the time Nicole made the Santa discovery, then
extrapolated to the tooth fairy and the Easter bunny, and cried the entire
day. Nothing I could say would console
her. To comfort her that night as I lay
beside her in her bed, I glanced around the darkened room and saw a box of
magic tricks on her shelf. “Honey, it’s
like magic,” I finally said. “When you
watch a magician, even though you know there’s a trick to everything, it’s
still fun to see how he does it.” Nicole
looked up at me and said, “You mean there’s no magic, either?”
All the
things you’ve taught me reminds me how few have actually sunk in. Safety, for example. The same year Richie had to see a plastic
surgeon for picking up a Piccolo Pete firecracker, Brandon created a mushroom
cloud bomb in the cul de sac, which rattled all the neighbors’ windows. This is not how I taught them to celebrate
the Fourth of July. And you’re not
supposed to drive into the Bishop’s car, either.
To My
Beautiful Mother reminds me of the time I was leaning over my bathroom counter,
in my underwear, putting makeup on.
Nicole was standing behind me, watching for a few minutes, then asked,
“Mom, do they make a butt bra?”
What would
I do without you? This has it’s own
answer, doesn’t it? The minute I drive
off to the airport for a long overdue vacation, I can almost hear the paper
shredder making confetti, and the phone dialing for pizza delivery. Strains of “Tequila” echo down the block, and
before I get 500 feet away, it’s Party Time.
No, there
really isn’t a card that captures motherhood accurately. Maybe if one said, “Well, we’ve survived each
other this far,” but I don’t expect to see that one rolling off the lines anytime
soon at Hallmark. So I open the cards
and smile at the poems, embrace the humility of knowing they’re aren’t exactly
true, and know that it won’t be long until one reads, “Now that you live in a
padded cell…”
And speaking of moms, I am, after all, your YOUTUBE MOM. Check out my channel here and subscribe! Soon you'll be sending me a card, I just know it.
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