It’s Mother’s Day!

“Biology is the least of what makes someone a mother.”

~Oprah Winfrey

It is Mother’s Day. A day when eternally grateful children send flowers, make phone calls, and enjoy brunch with the people they call Mom. Okay, maybe children are actually guilted into all the hype thanks to Hallmark, but hey, I’ll take it! I love Mother’s Day! To me, it signals the beginning of Kim Month – Mother’s Day and birthday. (I secretly brand it the month of buying stuff for me.)

I am fortunate enough to have three wonderful daughters (because aren’t all our daughters wonderful? But mine really are!) and four women I appreciate and love that I can call ‘mom’. First is my steadfast and dedicated  mom mom, who birthed, raised, and loved me into the exceptional human I am. Later in life I welcomed three other spectacular women into my world: my now deceased jovial mother-in-law, my caring stepmom, and my selfless step-mother-in-law.

Four moms. Isn’t it interesting that moms come into our lives through different circumstances?

In the 5 decades I have been around, the definition of “mom” has undergone great transformation. I would like to take a moment to honor all individuals who deserve to be recognized and appreciated on Mother’s Day:

• Employed-outside-the-home moms.

• Not-employed-outside-the-home moms.

• Expectant moms.

• Single moms.

• Single dads that play the role of both mom and dad.

• Lesbian couples.

• Gay couples.

• Women who have given their child up for adoption.

• Those who have chosen to adopt children.

• Those who have taken on the role of “guardian” (Personally, I do not care for that word. It is much too cold and sterile.)

• Those who have chosen not to have children and are amazing aunts, friends, mentors to young people they encounter.

• Those who have experienced the agony of the death of a child, including miscarriages. (No words…..)

• Those who have lost moms. Accept my heartfelt condolence.

• Those who happily parent furry four-legged friends.

• Transgender individuals.

• Sister-Friends who love unconditionally.

So on this day in which we honor our mothers, no matter how they have come into our lives, I want to honor each and every one of you. Children are not born with instruction manuals, therefore we do the very best we can with the skills, knowledge, abilities that we have.

In other words:

Mom, You Rock!

Now, go shopping. I will meet you in the shoe department……We deserve it.

“Grown don’t mean nothing to a mother. A child is a child. They get bigger, older, but grown? What’s that suppose to mean? In my heart it don’t mean a thing.”

~Toni Morrison, Beloved, 1987