I meant to write a post for Mother's Day, but I just didn't get around to it. I had a great weekend with my friend Sarah in Dallas. We came back early Sunday morning and the boys spent the rest of the day with me :-)
My mom was/still is a very special person to me. I always knew she worked hard, but until I had kids I never knew how hard. I have a fantastic husband. He is great with the kids. He helps out with them more than I hear most of my friends say their husbands do. How my mom managed with just herself I will never know. I realize that she had my grandparents, but they weren't there every moment.
My mom was also not known for her fashion sense. I rarely agreed with what she suggested that we buy growing up. Things were always "cool" to her, when they weren't to anyone else except maybe the buyer for the store. And pantyhose, well those were a relationship sore spot. On the way to my high school graduation we had to stop at KMART because "Stephanie, every other girl will have on pantyhose. This is a dressy occasion" Regardless of the fact that I pointed out that you couldn't see my legs under my robe, we still stopped. I made sure to point out every girl (and by every I mean 99/100 girls walking into graduation) that did not have on pantyhose. At my college graduation, she merely questioned me. "Stephanie, are you going to wear pantyhose with that dress?" I just gave her a look that answered her question. By PT school graduation, I just saw her look at my legs. She never asked.
Fast forward a couple years later and we are in Dress Barn. My mom insists that I buy this jacket. I argued and argued, but she went as far as to buy the jacket for me. I never wore it. They were not really in style anymore as far as I could tell. I hung it up in the back of my closet and that is were it stayed. Through the past 2 moves even. I go through my closet periodically to pull out stuff to donate. For some reason I have never gotten rid of it. I guess for whatever reason I kept it after she died because it was a reminder of who my mom really was. In the past year though, I have tried it on a couple times. It still fits. And... my mom was right. Jean jackets aren't out of style after all :-)
I thought about all this on Mother's Day. I know that my mom isn't here to find out all the things I understand about her now. She won't know all the things that I can admit now that she was right about. Or will she. She probably knew all along. And, one day I will realize watching my boys that they knew I was right about one thing or another, even though they will NEVER admit it.
