For Mom

I actually wrote this for Sunday Sweets over on CW this week, but it ended up being such an Epbot thing, I decided to share it here, too. You guys just get different pictures. (If you'd rather see this illustrated with pretty cakes, then check out the Cake Wrecks version.)

I'm not sure when it happened, exactly - maybe sometime in middle school? - but I'll always remember the day Mom told me I was skipping school, and we were going shopping instead.

We spent the morning driving around to Goodwill and various thrift shops, trying on clothes, singing along to the car radio, and later stopping at Subway for lunch - which I remember being a treat, because we got those amazing cookies for dessert.

We didn't talk about school. We didn't talk about my friends or grades or any of those awkward teenage "body-changing" topics. We just told each other which tops looked best, chatted about nothing, laughed, and had fun.

It was the first time I realized Mom wasn't just my mom, she was also my friend.

 (I'm actually in my 20s here, but it's the oldest non-baby pic I could find of us together.)

Mom was an RN while I was growing up, which meant my brother and I got zero sympathy for our scraped knees and boo-boos. Don't get me wrong; Mom was an expert at patching us up - but if we wanted a hearty "You poor thing!", then Dad was the place to go.

I later learned Mom was working nights in the ICU then, and routinely saw the kind of pain and grief I can't even fathom, because she came home in the morning and smiled and hugged us just the same.

Mom's nursing graduation photo.

Baaaaby pictuuuuures.

 Love my mom's hair here.

 

 My folks' dapper hat game was strong, y'all.

Once, on another hooky day with Mom, she and I went to the matinee of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - you know, the first live-action one?

It was terrible. But Mom loves terrible kid movies, and to this day she'll request we see whatever the latest animated or G-rated flick is, no matter how ominous the reviews, and then she'll laugh and gasp and have so much fun that you'll wind up loving it, too.

In my teens Mom was in a car accident that prevented her from ever working as a nurse again. She had to wear a neck brace for ages, and later had a surgery to wire her jaw shut for a while. Then she got braces... at the same time *I* had braces. 

People kept mistaking us for sisters, which Mom REALLY liked, but I found mortifying - especially that time an older friend of mine hit on her... with me standing right there.

 (I'm appreciating those good genes now, but at the time I was still being offered the children's menu in high school. Ha!)

Today my folks live in a different state, but I'm proud to say they are still my friends. We visit often, and have even gone to Dragon Con together the last few years, where Mom loves dressing up steampunk - with outfits she still puts together from the thrift store.

Lately Mom likes to video chat and show me all the crafts she's teaching during her volunteer work at the local retirement home. And now she and Dad have joined a Harley Davidson group/club/gang(?), so they spend weekends taking long rides together decked out in the most, um, fascinating fashions.

I could have gone my whole life without seeing my mother in leather chaps, you guys. MY WHOLE LIFE.

Mom's the most servant-hearted person I know, and has seen and endured a lot of pain, though you'd never know it. Somehow she's managed to keep a sense of wonder and whimsy through life - something I try hard to emulate. She raised me to love reading and Star Trek and fantasy and fun, and taught me that when the going gets rough, you turn up the music and sing extra loud - and off-key. ;)

Taken last month in Knockturn Alley at Wizarding World.

For my folks' 40th anniversary a few years ago, we sent them to Disney World - mostly for Mom - and I'll never forget her delight when we told her the news.

She's the big kid who makes you remember how great life really is sometimes - even when life really isn't so great. The best moms are like that. And days like today help us remember to thank our moms, and be grateful for the things we just didn't know how to appreciate when we were younger.

So happy Mother's Day, Mom. Thanks for showing me that when I thought you were being the most embarrassing, you were really showing me how to be the best adult. I love you, I'm proud of you, and I hope we can go shopping again sometime soon.

My favorite picture of my Mom ever - though I'll admit I'm biased, since I'm the one who took it. 


Thanks for indulging my trip down Memory Lane, gang.