This Sunday is the day, which has been set aside to honor mom, Mother’s Day. Now in reality we should be honoring mom every day, but most of us choose to let them honor us instead. And most moms continue to honor us long after the time when we should be taking care of things ourselves.

When I was growing up, my mother did everything. I never knew how to cook, clean house, or do laundry until after I was married. Boy, was that a shock. You mean all this stuff has not been doing itself for all these years?

When we mature and separate from our family of birth, we tend to find fault and be critical. Mom either does too much and smothers us, or not enough and we feel neglected. Mom can’t win.

It’s been said that the older we become, the wiser our parents seem to get. That’s especially true when baby comes along and we don’t have the first idea about what to do for colic, diarrhea, or a fever. And so we call good old mom, now the source of wisdom and experience.

Of course, nobody ever appreciates us as much as our mothers, in spite of our shortcomings. Ever hear the mother of a convicted murderer say on TV what a good boy her son was before he became a murderer?

We try to do the impossible and say thanks for a lifetime of sacrifice with a card, a gift, or a bunch of flowers – so inadequate for what mothers do for their kids. We try to say thank you in one day for voluntary losses so great and so numerous that no gift could ever be thanks enough.

Some believe that we pay back our mother by sacrificing for our own children. But, what about people that don’t have children? They get a free ride? While there may some repayment with a short period of roll reversal as parents grow old, for most of life mom will be the caregiver and we will be the care receiver.

Mom doesn’t want more gadgets to dust, more nightgowns to put in the dresser drawer, or flowers to aggravate her allergies. If only it could be that simple. What a mother wants is for her children to do something to show that she has succeeded in her most important role in life, being a mother.

All mothers have an invisible bag inside where they save up the memories that their children have created. Sometimes they share them with friends who are also mothers, but mostly they simply save these things to ponder and think about in moments of lesser achievement.

Mother cures our ills with chicken soup while telling us that we should have listened to her and taken an umbrella, whether it was raining or not. Mothers always know. We do not understand these phenomena, but they seem to have a sixth sense when it comes to their children. Whatever happens, mother knew that it would happen one of these days. Thank God it wasn’t worse!

What’s the use? We keep saying thanks for things we can’t possible thank mother for. So, how can we really repay mom? Simple, grow up to be a somewhat worthwhile person and as an added bonus do something to make her proud.

That’s really all a mother wants anyhow – except, perhaps, a nap.

©2003 Sheila Moss