Happy Birthday

33 years ago today, you brought me into this world. Your resilient strength is living proof of the powerful ability we have to change our own circumstance. I’m so proud of all you’ve overcome these past few months, you are an inspiration. It’s a full circle moment for me, I totally get it now. Thank you for all the sacrifice and selfless acts of love you have given over the past 33 years…I will be forever grateful and a piece of you will always go with me. This is for you mom.

December 2009
My first glimpse at mortality came late last year. I learned my mom had two heart attacks and suddenly, everything stood still. I’ve loss special people in my life before but this scare was something different. I understood differently than I had before… I needed my mom more than I had ever known.

Of course I’ve always loved my mom. Moms are permanent fixtures, they belong with their children and I had never imagined it any other way. Every family has one person with whom everyone stays connected, this is my mom. She is the glue holding my family together.

When I first received the phone call, I was in shock. I didn’t yet know how bad it was and my mind began wandering to places it’s never been before. This is what it means to grow up, I am an adult. Bad things happen and life goes on…you don’t always get a choice. I’M a mom now, I can’t need anyone else like this anymore, and I needed to be stronger than this—for Ava. Without trying to sound morbid, it was as if I was already trying to adjust to the idea. A self preservation mode began to ensue as I felt myself callus, avoiding the alternative.

Laughter.
When people talk about mom, they smile. I imagine they are hearing her laugh. I envisioned never hearing my mom’s laughter again, (you always know she’s there before you see her) this is the first thought to come to mind. Her contagious laugh has become a language of its own, one of the many reasons I love her. My mom is someone who can entirely transform the energy in a room by her presence and her laugh. (You will usually find her in the kitchen).

Compassion.
My mom, she has a million expressions and an equal amount of emotion to match each one. She is the most emotional, vulnerable human being I have ever met…it’s beautiful. You can see other people’s pain in her eyes, her depth of compassion is unlike anything I’ve ever seen.

Family has always been most important to mom. No amount of money or material possession stands a chance up next to the value she puts on family. Mom lives life larger than anyone I know—everything is blown perfectly and completely out of proportion. I watch how excited she gets over the simplest of moments and am overwhelmed with admiration. She teaches many lessons with the way she lives her life.

Trust.
It once drove me crazy, how gullible she is—mom will believe anything you tell her and trusts everyone she meets. The older I get the more I learn; most people don’t possess this gift. People have become so cynical and skeptical, one of the reasons our world is so dark. Many of us are closed and self-focused, not mom (I often tease her for making a best friend out of every stranger she meets). With mom you get to see everything, all at once; her transparency draws you closer to her.

Too many of us go an entire lifetime, never scratching the surface of where mom lives life—in pure, authentic, earnest truth. Mom, thank you. The fear and doubt of raising Ava will diminish each time I see in her—if even so slightly—a reflection of you.