Dear
Mother:
I’m all right.
Stop worrying about me.
f
Egyptian letter, 2,000 B.C.
R
|
ight from the start, I want to go on record as being one
of my mother’s biggest fans. How could I not be when she’s the source of most
of this book’s material? And, having learned at the feet of a master, I am able
to bring all the wisdom, skill, and je ne sais quoi to parenting my own
kids.
If you’ve ever been a kid, you lived what I’m talking about.
If you’re a parent or grandparent, you know what I’m talking about.
If you’re a mother, you are
what I’m talking about.
The time has come to view mothers for what they really are:
living, breathing human beings. Over the last few years there’s been an
outpouring of books and articles about the blessedness of mothers. Oh, how
wonderful they are in their saintly devotion to their children. These unsung
heroes blah blah blah yadda yadda yadda.
Oh, please.
When you’re a mom, you do what you have to. It means staying
calm while your precious child pukes all over you. It means
arriving at an event where you’re going to present your new baby only to find
that sometime during the drive he’s had a blowout – one that coats him from butt to hair. And after cleaning him up as best you can, you discover that the emergency backup outfit in the
diaper bag neither matches nor fits. However, you're made of sturdy stuff, so you
squeeze your little bundle o’ love into that outfit and carry your progeny into
the party anyway.
Being a mother means hearing “I love you” and “I hate you”
from the same little person over the course of the same day -- sometimes within the same hour. It means keeping your cool when
your child is bleeding, crying, throwing up, and having a red-faced tantrum,
sometimes all at the same time. It means being the object of your child’s love
for your—and his—lifetime.
f e
I've really enjoyed working on this book ... so much so that I've kept at it off and on for more years than I care to count. I found so many people who had similar experiences with their moms – and as moms themselves – and heard
the same timeless expressions. We cracked each other up as we shared our
mothers’ wisdom and sometimes even got into can-you-top-this contests for the
most sublimely ridiculous experiences with our own mothers.
I hope you enjoy reading this blog as much as I have writing
it. I'm hopeful that by blogging this material, rather than keeping it on my hard drive, will keep it fresh (and me productive) in the months to come. "We shall see," as my mom would say.
If you think I’ve missed a crucial bit of motherly wisdom,
please let me know. I imagine there’s enough out there to make this a never-ending project.
