Mother's Day

I'm not going to lie, I was bracing for the worst Mother's Day ever.

The problem with me is that I value holidays in the exact same way 5 year old children do.  My parents were always extra celebratory, making a huge deal of every holiday, which is probably why I am this way.  Last year we didn't see fireworks of the forth of July and I carried an 80 lb. weight around in my heart for months.  I likely didn't recover until Thanksgiving.  Generally, I like to celebrate everything.  Memorial Day gets a BBQ.  The 4th of July gets fireworks.  A birthday is never a birthday without a cake and presents (and maybe a tiara, the times they are a changing').  Thanksgiving needs a feast and a turkey.  Christmas means endless gifts, cookies, carrots, a tree, and peppermint everything! Halloween has to have tons of candy, spiderwebs, creepy crawlies, witches and homemade costumes and East wouldn't be Easter without baskets and bunnies.  And I promise you that the calendar would not change without a fancy dinner, horns, a ball drop and alcohol on New Years Eve.  My point:  holidays are a really big deal to me.

This year my husband is working the night shift, 7 pm to 7 am and this was a week when he was schedule to work both Saturday night and Sunday night.  So, he got home from work, slept and got back up and went directly back into work.  We decided to celebrate Mother's Day on his next day off, which is Wednesday.

Even though I completely understand this in my brain, my selfish and adolescent heart was tantruming for days as Mother's Day approached.

I don't really even know why!

I have a wonderful family!  My children are loving (maybe not today... see my previous post) and in my heart I know that my husband and children love and appreciate me every day.  An arbitrary date in May has no bearing on their respect for me.  We have plans to go shopping on Wednesday and buy everything it takes to create my dream yard--  So, why did I feel so wounded?

I really can't answer that.

What I can tell you is that my husband gave me the best gift that I've gotten in years.  On Mother's Day morning he gave me a nice, dutiful card and a mixed cd.  He hasn't given me a mixed cd since we were dating.  All 20 songs are purposeful.  Some are theme songs to tv shows that we watch.  Some he wrote about me, way back in the day.  One was our wedding song. Some I can remember listening to together in those early years.  And some are clearly reflective of our lives now.  I was sincerely really touched by this gift and it turned my whole day around.  I realized that I'd rather have this mixed cd than any other present in the world.  There is no dream backyard and no piece of jewelry or gadget that I would want more.  (I am a super cheap date.)

Here's one of the songs!  I've never heard it before but I can't stop listening to it!



This really changed my day around.  I relaxed with the girls and we made and decorated a cake together.  Then I made a big dinner for them and curled up in bed with a horrible book that I'm unable to stop reading.