Today is my mom's 68th birthday. Yes, it falls just a few days before Christmas. I am sure that all throughout her life she has felt like she gets cheated out of a separate or bigger celebration because it is so close to Christmas. In addition, all the years she was married to my father, her anniversary was the 17th, so she really got cheated out of two separate celebrations.
I do make it a point to get her a separate present. I usually even try to wrap it in birthday paper. This year all I had was race cars and I decided that was probably not in her wheelhouse. Plus, I got her a whole bunch of little things and have been wavering back and forth on which to give her for which holiday all week.
The one benefit of having her birthday near Christmas now that we live so far away is that I get to be here to help her celebrate more often. Being married and living so far away, I can't always come "home" all the time. My immediate family has to take precedence some years. The years Chad is home and we have the boys, we usually don't travel for the holidays. But right now, while he is deployed and she is little enough to travel on my lap, we can afford the time and money to travel. So I get to be here about every other year for her special day.
My mom doesn't talk much about her childhood or family, but I know it wasn't always very happy. She had demons that chased her into adulthood, as we all do. As I become more and more the adult, I realize how important it is to be there for her and let her know how special she is. She may not have cured cancer or ever go down in a history book, but her life mattered. The love she showered over us is getting passed down to my niece, nephew, daughter and my sisters' patients and nursing staff, and my students. Her love and kindness and creativity for making learning part of every day is something very special.
I respect her more and more. I teach to and with people daily who didn't have the family my dad and mom gave us. I really respect that my parents didn't come from the good wholesome family they created, so they had to create all new molds to build from. It is hard not to become your parents, and they both did it, and gave us parents we would want to emulate. A very impressive feat as a parent. While we all went through the stage of "I will never say . . . to my children", I don't think that I will do too much very differently. I had a pretty great role model as a mother.
Mom and I did a little shopping today for Christmas. I left the baby with my sister and went out. It was nice getting Mom all to myself for a little while. We didn't really talk about anything deep. My mom isn't always very open emotionally to deep talks and our family is more subtle, but I did get to tell her tonight before she left how special it is to be able to share her birthday with her.
Today was a hard day for the other side of my family. Chad's Aunt Jeana's birthday was also today and a year ago today, we buried his Grandma Nick. Part of my sentimentality is knowing that my mom will someday no longer be here. I don't want to have any regrets. I know that Jeana and Martha were loved and celebrated all the time, and they are missed. Having my mom with me as a new mom is a joy and I know I need to treasure and respect the blessing it is to have her in my life. I hope she gets to be here for another twenty or thirty years.
Happy Birthday Mom, and Jeana if you're watching from heaven.
you made me think today ;) thanks!
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