Dear Tina,
Happy Mother’s Day! I hope your daughter treats you to all the amenities most children under the age of eight provide: freshly cut flowers from your own garden and homemade gift certificates for 5 hugs and 10 ‘I love you’s.’ To be used at your discretion of course. When my sister and I were little my dad used to take us to Osco Pharmacy the weekend of Mother’s Day and let us pick out anything in the store we thought might serve as an appropriate gift for Mother’s Day. I can’t tell you how many ceramic unicorns my mom received in the first six or so years of celebrating Mother’s Day. One year we out did ourselves and found a bell with a unicorn’s head on the top–that was like a twofer. Then once we went totally off theme and found a salmon colored ceramic castle with a sparkly red heart on the door. And every year, without fail, my mom would open her gifts and act as though we had found the one thing she had wanted her whole life. Gifts so beautiful only her 4 and 5 year old would have known to search high and low– in the aisle next to the foot creams–until they found the pieces that were just right.
This afternoon I was at the same pharmacy, now a CVS, for a strep test (turns out strep throat symptoms were most likely caused by a constant need to out-sing Lea Michele in my car as the test came back negative) and considered purchasing a similar knick knack as a nod to a simpler time. But spending money on nostalgia just for the receiver to say “Oh hahaha, yes I remember. Now where’s the pile for the rummage sale?” felt wasteful. Instead, I followed my instincts and went to my mom’s favorite store and found a bracelet that she would wear because she actually liked it, not just to spare my tender feelings. Sure as a mom you miss the days of 8:00 bedtimes and the sounds of little feet running towards you when they hear you walking through the door. Especially as you enter the stage when you’re fielding requests for chaperone-less trips to Mexico and money to replace a lost cell phone for the 4th time. But eventually the wickedness of the teenage years wears off, and your children begin to realize that you are their shining example of what they hope to become as they grow up. Little kids can tell you they love you, but adult kids can tell you why they love you. So in a very special edition of Dear Tina and in honor of my mom celebrating her 25th Mother’s Day this year, I offer up publicly a small selection from the many reasons I couldn’t be more grateful for the woman who raised me.
- For letting me dress myself without ever criticizing my personal style. Even when that meant complimenting me on my first day of kindergarten when I wore a bathing suit with leggings.
- For loving your career and never letting such a stressful and demanding job affect the time you spent with your children.
- For ignoring my tantrums.
- For not forcing me to eat my vegetables when you knew that eventually, I would become an adult, and eat them on my own accord.
- For telling me that someday a man will fall in love with me for my laugh. And for not caring when that day is.
- For not giving me a cell phone until I was a junior in high school, because, you were right, I really didn’t need one.
- For crying with me when I cry.
- For waking me up when I was younger by stroking my hair instead of the way dad did it by pulling up the blinds and shouting gospel songs.
- For believing me when I told you I wasn’t drinking in high school and saying to my sister when you heard I had started drinking in college, “Oh thank God.”
- For having a bachelor’s degree in French and an enormously successful business career. You just wait and see what I do with that Acting degree of mine.
- For never buying us a dog. I think the fate of our guinea pig proved that wouldn’t have been a good idea.
- For wanting more for me than I know to want for myself.
- For telling me that pale skin can be beautiful too.
- For teaching me to always pay off credit card bills in full and not spend money I don’t have.
- For loving my dad, your husband, as much as he loves you.
- For still giving me gifts from Santa.
- For developing a love of American Idol.
- For reading this blog and believing that it could really change my life. Because most days even I don’t believe that.
- For figuring out how to balance your friendships and your job and your children and your marriage. And embracing this challenge rather than resenting it.
Happy Mother’s Day.
30 Rock Quote of the Day:
Jack: Geiss is sending signals about retirement, about succession.
Liz: By talking about sex in a sailing magazine?
Jack: That’s exactly how Margaret Thatcher did it.
Dear Tina 