My wife is a mother, mentor, and inspiration to our two children. Today she and countless other mothers are wondering where the vases are for all the roses and how she could possibly be expected to eat all of that chocolate. As is always the case, she will find a solution.
Today is Mother's Day--not everywhere in the world, but pretty much everywhere and in most all of the places you or I are ever likely to go or be, so that's a good deal. I've heard that florists sell more flowers, that more greeting cards are bought and mailed, and that more telephone calls are made on this one day in the United States than on any other day of the year, all of which underscores how significant so many of us see this day as being.
My mother grew up as the second-oldest child, and the second daughter in a large family. In the course of her life, her older sister, all three of her younger brothers, and her husband of nearly thirty years all died before she passed in June of 2017. She and her husband, my father, had six children in two cohorts. I have no idea how many grandchildren she had, but I have little doubt that she knew and that's what's important.
She was a breast cancer survivor who, in light of how often she had been dealt from the bottom of the deck, could have been a very different person than the tiny and more fragile-than-I-remember-her-from-the-last-time woman who called every year on my birthday or at Christmas, before she walked across the street to the beach (she lived in Florida because she hated snow) and who was always ready to offer advice, when asked, on any topic under the sun but who never pushed her viewpoint because she didn't want to seem bossy.
My wife's mom lived farther away from us than Florida; in Offenbach, Germany, and was born in the same year as my mother. They met once, a very long time ago, when Oma America, as our daughter Michelle, called my mother, came to visit and had afternoon coffee with Oma Germany. My wife's mom's husband passed away many years ago after we arrived here in the States, and her Mom died some years later. My wife's family is a bit smaller than mine--two younger sisters and a younger brother.
Both Moms were born in a world in the throes of the Great Depression, lived much of their teen years in a world at war, and then had and raised their own families in the uneasy truce that followed as the world that was created terrors and technology that have become the landscape of the world that is, now.
Like your Mom, my mother and my wife's mother aren't in the pages of a history book someplace, though, without being indelicate about this, we have an opportunity to have a history at all because of them. I've wondered how different, and better, this world would be if Moms were in charge.
Let's face it, Moms are always wizards patching scraped knees from the playground and broken hearts from the same place. Moms can also assemble that science fair project from stuff under the sink the night before it is due, and they are always available to quiz you before those Friday spelling tests. Why would 'real world' issues like arms control, or immigration be too hard for them?
Moms make the impossible happen every day. Happy Mother's Day.
-bill kenny
