Isn't She Lovely

When I was born,  Isn't She Lovely by Stevie Wonder was popular. It was written for Stevie's daughter, and it always makes my mom think of me. We danced to it at my wedding. It also makes me think of her.

Today my mom is 56. She's at peace in her life, she strives to be her best self daily, and she has strong belief in the power of positive thought. It's a good time to be her, especially since her and Rich just put a salt water cement pool in, which she refers to as a healing ocean oasis (HOO).

As she often says, thoughts are things. From her I've learned to put good ones out there as much as I can. She also always reminds me to be grateful for every little thing. She's very different from the mom I had growing up to the person she is now. She's slowed down a bit to smell the roses, she's more serene and tries not to sweat the small stuff.

It's interesting how your relationship with your parents changes as you grow older. The're not just your parents - they are people, just like you, with strengths and weaknesses. They are not perfect, and if they were good parents, they taught you that you weren't expected to be either.

My mom is wonderfully eccentric and has the nickname Loopy to match. She wears a hair mane she still has from the 1980s. She drinks asti spumante and likes to toast. She busts out in spontaneous cheers she remembers from her high school days. You could say she's a bit of a character. 

Hair mane, clutching wine glass, Down on the Redskin Reservation cheer

She tweets. She can twirl a fire baton. She loves babies and is a great mom mom to Colin and Riley. She loves "her songs." She never wants to run out of anything, and she always has a lot of food and drink at parties - I get it from her. She loves to take sleeping pictures of people.

Mom & Kit Kat D, Sleeping at her 50th birthday shore weekend

If she could, my mom would never leave her house - she is happy and content there. She'd also love for all of her chickens to live on that street. She brings my dogs bones and cut up hotdogs when she visits them. She always gets an updo for weddings. She is not comfortable being a passenger in the car with any of her children.

At Tiffany's wedding, with two of my favorite people at mine

My mom is a good cook and an excellent baker. I'd rather eat something she bakes than anything from a store. She's Durham Deli's number one customer. She's a wonderful hostess and is the only person I've ever seen bring a lace tablecloth to a tailgate.

My mom putting a lace tablecloth on a card table at the Manchester U game in 2003

Mom-isms:
-We are all God's children.
-I'm hellbent for election.
- <curse> Pardon my french.
-I light you all every day.
-Eating like I'm going to the chair.
-Just shoot me.
-JMJ (Jesus, Mary and Joseph)
-Don't go to the bathroom alone (she says this when you're going out, not when you're at home)
-Beware of chloroform
-I haven't ___________ since Hector was a pup (to imply a long time).
-Whatever you say you are.
-Be-you-tee-ful for beautiful
-Ween for wine
-GFY (the nice way to say go .... yourself)

My mother carried three children over nine pounds, and none of us look like her. I have her mannerisms and her nasal voice, but that's all. She raised me to be a strong woman, confident in myself, self-sufficient, and sure that I could do anything I set out to do.

When I think of my mom, I think of love, peace signs, white lights, perfume, Adidas outfits, light, hair manes, candles, flowers, and baked goods.

It's not easy to write about your parents. They knew you when you were just a wish, they see you in all of your phases, they love you through it, whatever it is. I talk to my mom every day. When I thought about writing something for her birthday, nothing came. It's too hard to put something down without thinking you're forgetting something huge, that you won't say what you really mean and will miss the mark. Then I thought hello, she's my mom. Someone who has a scent I would know anywhere. In the end it's not the big things that paint a picture of who someone is. It's the little quirks and scraps of information piled up over the years. Those little details are what I love the most. It's a privilege to know the small things about someone.

Happy birthday mom. I love you.

p.s. Happy birthday to my cousin Ashley, my mom's birthday friend.

p.p.s. Good luck today Gwen! I'm thinking of you

p p infinity s: make this: http://lemonchiffoncake.blogspot.com/2012/06/donna-giblins-artichoke-chicken.html