Mothers

It’s easier to become a mother than it is to be one.  There is no job that demands so much skill and receives so little training.

I have been blessed by being surrounded by a lot of mothers.  I, of course, have a mother who we will talk about a little further on.  I have two sisters and they are both mothers.  They have seven children between them and two of those women are now mothers.  I had two wives that became mothers.  I helped with that part. They produced three daughters, two are now mothers with seven children between them.  These children are all too young to be mothers but three of them probably will be...  If motherhood could be measured by the success of their children, then the mothers that have surrounded my life are all incredible.  If you measure motherhood by their personal success and accomplishments, they have all excelled.  Finally, if we measure motherhood by their success at producing children that add value to mankind then they have all been outstanding.  I know a lot about all of these mothers.  I have a general and very specific knowledge of how they grew up.  I have a good idea of what they enjoy doing and a clear memory of their achievements.  I even have a pretty good idea of their disappointments and shortcomings.  In short, I know a lot about these wonderful mothers except one… My mother.  My knowledge of my mother is limited by the number of years that I lived under the same roof.  I do not know anything about her growing up.  Oh, I have pictures but I have no first-hand knowledge or memory of her in the formative years. I missed the first 30 years of her life.  I knew the adult.  My adult mother was a strong and exacting person.  She had a very specific way of doing everything.  She believed in the strength of women and her daughters are proof of that.  Although she was a stay-at-home mom, she raised her daughters to be accomplished young women with diverse interests and accomplishments.   Politically conservative she was socially accepting of all people with whom she connected.  What I missed was my mother playing at the beach as a child. Was she athletic; did she have play dates; did she date in high school; did she date at all; a self-starter at school? I experienced the end result of growing up but not the experiencing of growing up.  That is reading the story after the good part has been redacted.  I know a lot of this information about all the other mothers of my life.

I understand that parenting is changing but while I was having children fatherhood was relatively simple to understand.  The vestiges of hierarchy still existed.  ‘Wait until your father comes home,’ was still an expression of potential dread or something big was about to happen.  Motherhood is complicated and extraordinarily demanding.  Nurse, cook, disciplinarian, chauffeur, coach, teacher, spiritual guide, counselor-in-chief, and consoler-in-chief. Oh, and she also has a career.  My mother was all of these, like most moms she was not perfect and had her weaknesses.  I know she liked to play bridge, she like her dogs, she was very particular about how she dressed and where she shopped for everything from food to clothing.  But mostly she ran the show and we all deferred to her. I am in awe of mothers and all they do while still trying to remain attractive, fun, and relevant.  It is a tall order.

On this day after Mother’s Day, I wish them a moment of quiet reflection on the breadth of their accomplishments and the depth of their abilities.

I still wonder what my mother was like in junior high Scholl or better yet don’t you want to know what she did that she never told her mother?   It is that part of her life I will never truly be able to appreciate or know.  I will just have to be content with knowing the adult mother. 

Happy Mother’s Day