Happy Birthday Mom!

My mother would have been, let's see, I have no idea old today.  She always hated that her birthday was 4 days after Christmas, which prompted all of us to have specific birthday gifts - not the usual, "This is for Christmas AND your birthday!"

I miss my Mom on her birthday, more than most days.  As a birthday gift for her, here's a few things about my Mom that make me smile.

1.  Every holiday we'd bring a nice (not our usual 2 buck chuck) wine for the holiday dinner.  My mother would accept it and say, "Wow, this is wonderful, let me put it in the refrigerator now so it's nice and cold for dinner."  You know what, we never said anything just drank cold Zinfindel.

2.  We had a golden retriever named Red that went to obedience school three times and never listened to any of us.  Except one time, he jumped out of the window in a moving car on the highway and my mother chased him down Rt 29 until she yelled in her Mom Voice, "Red SIT!"  Surprise to everyone, he actually sat.

3.  We had a terrific wind storm at our neighborhood the day one of my neighbors decided or his wife made him get rid of his Playboy collection.  His trash can fell over and the magazines flew all over the neighborhood.  I can see my mother out in her raincoat, golashes, big winter hat walking up and down the street collecting all those pictures of naked girls.  I never told her my brother found them in our trash can and SOME of them ended up in his tree house in the woods.

4.  My mother actually took me to the doctor when mosquito bites appeared on my chest.  She was afraid I had cancer, he said it was boobies.  After a few therapy sessions later in my life, I can laugh about it now.

5.  Taking a Twin Otter from Mainland Ireland to the Aran Islands and they had to weigh everyone BEFORE they boarded the plane.  On a Shorts 330 from Miami to the Bahamas she leaned over and whispered to me, "My Volkswagon has more aerodynamics than this thing."

6.  Dr. Norma always fixed a broken doll - broken from a fight between girls that involved yanking the doll between them until an arm was pulled off, or when SOMEONE got mad enough to stand by the couch and slam the doll against it until the head popped off (and not a one of us became a serial killer, go figure)  She never wore the uniform and most of our real bumps and bruises prompted the question, "Well I guess we could just cut the arm off?"

7.  The first time she met my husband we had been out to a party and she threw him out of the house, throwing beer cans at him as he walked down the street.  The second time she met him, he wrecked his car right before dinner, left the car and came to meet us, picking glass out of his suitcoat.  But obviously she liked him, (he lived with my family so far) because of her last notes said, "You two are made for each other...."  She was right even if they didn't get off to a good start.  (The showing up with a van to move me out before we were married didn't help either)

Growing up in the coal country of PA, my Mom taught me hard word and honesty will get you far, and don't take anything off of anyone.  She also worked out every day until she couldn't.  Finally, she always worked at bettering herself, to going back to school and demanding promotions.

I wish my Mom was around so I could ask her questions that I wouldn't ask anyone else, something like, "I don't remember you being this bitchy when your menopause started, is there something wrong with me?"  Or how do you make it through those wild feelings of waking up and your kids are grown, how did you handle that?  Or remember those nutty rolls, they've never been the same, can you write that recipe down for me again?  Finally, I really miss those girls trips when we all let our hair down and talked about anything and everything, especially these questions---obviously deleted here.

Here's to a great Mom, and a great birthday.  The only person brave enough to go up to the Sister that was principle at our school and tell her she was, "snowing in the south."  Those that get it, get it.

Much love, Kels

Oh by the way, happy birthday to my bestie - Nicole, you share the same values as a great person!!!