Thanks, Mom

Recently one of my friends published her 100th blog post. She had obviously thought a lot about what she wanted to say on such a momentous occasion, and it was a lovely post.

I realized that I had two problems. First, did I have anything good enough to say for a 100th post? And second, what on earth does it mean about me that I have arrived at post #100 after less than four months of blogging?? (I looked at my friend's archive--it took her over a year to get to #100.)

I've been planning this for a couple of days, but I have been spending every second of spare time (and some not so spare) getting Cindy Lynn's Christmas package ready to go out yesterday. Her upcoming vacation to Club Med necessitated an earlier send date than I had originally anticipated, but it is in the mail now.

Now I can blog about my mom.

I don't usually think a lot about my mom. She had cancer and died almost 11 years ago, and at this point I am used to her not being a part of my every day life like she was before she died. But I've been thinking about her a lot lately--probably since blogging about the gloves.

This was my mom's "glamor shot." She had it taken about 10 years before she died.

When our mom died we sisters looked at each other and rejoiced in the things that we could see in each other that were like our mother. One sister loves babies like our mom did. Another looks so much like pictures of our mom when she was younger. The third is loving like our mom was. I actually felt quite left out in this listing of characteristics--I am very much like my dad. It took a lot of searching on my part before I found some of my mom in me; I love working with numbers, and I am (almost) always late. I know that is not a good characteristic to have, but I was just so excited to know that some part of me was like my mother.

I wonder if we can ever truly appreciate our loved ones while we still have them. That probably sounds like a terrible thing to say--but let's be real. Even the most compatible people clash from time to time, and it's easy to get caught up in the busy-ness of life and forget what a remarkable thing it is to have a life filled with loving family and friends.

I know I never appreciated my mom enough while she was alive. She was one of my closest friends and I talked to her almost every day--which was a big deal back in the days of expensive long distance charges. But how could I, the mother of young children, appreciate yet the mother she had been to me as a teenager? How would I really understand how amazing it was that one year 5 of her children were teenagers and she didn't kill anyone? Each new stage that I experience as a mother brings me a new appreciation for the woman that my mother was.

One of the remarkable things about my mom was that she did not come from a background that predicted success. Her family was very poor, and her mother died when my mom was 18. Her father remarried but it was an unhappy situation for the children.

She married a young man from an almost-as-poor family, and together they raised ten children. (Remember, my mother loved babies.) Both of my parents worked harder than I can conceive of to take care of their growing family.

I read a quote the other day that reminded me of my mom. I spent a lot of my teenage years noticing all of the things that my mom didn't do well, and thinking about how I would have done better. As a young mom I made sure to not repeat faults that I had seen in her mothering. It probably wasn't until a couple of years before she died that I realized how unimportant those particular characteristics were. I saw then that my mom excelled at the truly important virtues.

Maya Angelou said, "I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."

My mom made me feel amazing. I would rather have had my mother for 31 years than any other mom for a lifetime. She sent me off to college at financially stressful time and never told me how bad things were. She talked to me like I was the smartest, most wonderful person in the world. She asked my opinion often and never gave hers in a condescending or patronizing way. I could go on and on--I now have a list of things I wish I could thank her for, and an even longer list of things I would apologize about.

I wish I were more like my mother. I think she had the gift of true charity--the gift to be able to love others as Christ loves them. That's not a gift that I have--at least not right now. But I am resolved to try to do better. In this thing I would love for people to be able to remember that I was like my mother.