What My Mama and Every Mama Deserves to Hear

Daddy often said I could never be a lawyer. For all my back talkin’, I’d be held in contempt of court.

You’d just nod your head in agreement, maybe let out an “Mmmm hmmm” and for good reason. I had myself a mile wide sassy streak, and I liked to have the last word. And that must have driven you to your knees a hundred times and then some, praying for wisdom on how to show grace to a girl with a wild tongue and a flare for dramatics.

Much later, when the hard contractions set in before your twin grandsons made their entrance into the world, I remember apologizing for every sassy thing I ever said. And boy, did I mean it.

I also mean to tell you thank you for every gift you ever gave.

Do you remember how I used to get so nervous going to the doctor or the dentist, and you would tell me it’s going to be okay, this too shall pass and then we shall have a ice cream? Or a Sonic treat? You’d rub my back and calm me down and you were always right. I made it through and there were always cherry limeades or Braum’s ice cream.

Do you remember how I’d ask one thousand and one questions during every St. Louis Cardinals game or  Mandrell Sisters episode? How I wanted to know why baseball games had nine innings or who made the snazzy matchy outfits Barbara, Louise, and Irlene wore? You must have fought the urge to just throw me in bed and watch in peace.

Do you remember that time I didn’t make all-state orchestra? I called home from Oklahoma City, and I was pretty sure my life was over. You assured me my life would indeed go on just fine, and that my worth was not wrapped up in one little audition.

Do you remember how you stayed with David and I when the twins were born? How you cooked food, rocked babies, and generally encouraged us as we fumbled all whiplashed as parents to two babies? You didn’t criticize our choices. You said I was the most laid-back mama of newborns you’d ever seen, and this meant so much because I knew my up-tight nature all too well and just wanted to relax.

Do you remember that week when I couldn’t get off from school and David couldn’t get off from work, and you dropped everything and flew a thousand miles from Oklahoma to Ohio to be Grandma-on-duty?

And then when Faith had her surgery, do you remember reminding me of all the good things to be thankful for during the entire ordeal? How the light at the end of the tunnel would come? I clung to that somethin’ fierce.

I remember it all and more, how you sacrificed your time, your heart, and probably your tears to get me through the next doctor’s visit, music audition, and teenaged drama-laced crisis. Time and again, you remind me tunnels do end in light and “this too shall pass.” Somewhere during those days tucked inside the years of balancing faithful church attendance with letting me run wild in prairie fields with reigning in my fierce tongue, you taught me when I chase Blue Skies, the dark never wins.

Thank you for that, Mama. You are one in a million because He chose you to be mine. I love you!

 

Happily linking up at Ann’s today! Ann joins us in honoring our mamas by giving to the Child Survival Program in Haiti. So when we love on our moms, moms in Haiti will feel the love, too! And on that note, have you seen what glorious, beautiful things are happening in Tanzania right now thanks in part to the Compassion bloggers and sponsors like you?

 Top photo: Daddy, Mama and me in 1975. Ish.

Second photo: Daddy and Mama at the top of the Haleakala volcano on Maui.

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