I’ve been thinking a lot of about my mom recently, mostly
because I am now a mom myself. I find
myself looking at Liam and thinking, “there’s no way he’s leaving the house as
a teenager or he better have respect for women.” All these thoughts lead me back to what my
parents did for us and how they raised us.
It’s weird what memories stay with you from childhood and the imprint
they leave on you. My childhood memories
mostly involve being beat up by my brothers and spending time with my mom. It’s
not my mom’s birthday and it’s certainly not Mother’s Day yet, but this has
been on my heart to share with her. So,
mom, this post is for you…..
She spent time with me.
We stirred the cookie batter before we made cookies. We went grocery shopping at Aldi on Saturdays
and ate our bologna sandwiches in the car before we made the rounds (this
memory made me believe we were poor because rich kids got to eat fast food on
shopping trips. Little did I know she was
just being a wise spender =) She let me hold the center of the bows while we
wrapped Christmas presents so she could tie it.
She disciplined me. She
told me no…..often. I was very rarely in a “big trouble”, but I can recall the
times of, “Kelli, you’re being very rude.”
Hello, wake up call. She let me
whine, listened, and then told me I was whining.
She was/is my biggest fan.
She never missed a volleyball game, even when I sat the bench because
she was showing me that supporting my team was more important. She taught me that you won’t always be on the
floor, but that is no excuse for a bad attitude or lack of effort. She traveled
over 3 hours to watch me coach more than once.
She wore my sports button (if you were in grade school in the 90’s, you
know what I’m talking about!)
She loves Jesus. I’d
sneak downstairs on a Sunday morning and see her prepping for Sunday school
pouring over her Bible. She highlighted it
up and down and her worn pages showed me a woman who yearned for a deeper
relationship with God.
She is always positive.
She offers a different perspective when I’m naturally negative. She asks the hard questions and pushes me to
be better. She doesn’t let me settle for
less than my best.
She is generous. She
fills our cars with gas, stuffs $20 bills in our pockets and sends us with food
and our favorite drinks for our homes. She
sends me home with diapers and formula, and will mail me coupons and notes of
encouragement. She let me try any and
all of her food at restaurants (and still does). She comes to every one of my races, takes
care of my son, and sleeps on my couch countless times without
complaining. She is the definition of
selflessness.
She is real. I
complained to her during dad’s final days, when she was about to lose her
husband, that it was making me mad how non Christians never have to go through
pain like this (or so it seemed) and she
very frankly responded, “Yeah, maybe they don’t. But I feel really bad for those people
because they don’t have Jesus and we do.” What?! The strength of this woman is something I can
only pray I got a piece of in my DNA.
She taught me that it’s how you respond to the things that happen in
your life that make you who you are.
She is the best grandmother I know. She loves and treats each of her grandkids as
individuals. She plays games with them,
lets them share her bed, reads them stories, will drive hours to watch them
play sports, feeds them, changes dirty diapers (with enthusiasm mind you) and
loves spending time with them.
Heck, she is the best mom I know. These are MY memories but I know my brothers
have similar stories to share about her.
She was never my friend, but a mom.
A mom who knew that she was the adult, she would make mistakes, but she
was doing the best for her kids. She tried
every day. Now, as I’m a grown adult, I
see how she is the very best friend a person could wish for. She is supportive, never talked bad about me,
is always honest, laughs with me, and wants to talk to me and know how I’m
feeling.
So here is to my mom who rides the shopping cart through the
parking lot, cries when she laughs too hard, always has a box of wine in her
fridge, keeps tissues stuffed in every hoodie, has a bunker of expired food in
her basement, and has Certs in her purse that taste like the tissues they were
next too.
I love you Mom. You are
the inspiration for everything good I want to be.
