Sunday, May 8, 2011

Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious

I have so much to write about. I'm the worst about keeping up with this. In the near future you can look forward to a post about my friend Erin's wedding (at least one, it was quite the trip!), a visit to E.A. Poe's grave in Baltimore with my friend Tami, spring wrapping its tendrils around the city of Chicago, my expansive windowsill garden, and more...

But today I will write about my mom.

You may think your mom is fantastic--and I'm sure she's pretty swell--but I'm here to tell you that my mom is the ultimate, most extraordinary mother. Most extraordinary woman. She's supercalifragilisticexpialidicious. You know that part in Mary Poppins where Bert is singing the song with all of the different names in it and then ends with: "But the cream of the crop, the tip of the top, is Mary Poppins and there we stop!"? Well, that's my mom.

This is her on her 50th birthday. I had seen a painting at a museum in Grand Rapids that looked just like her! (Doesn't it?!) So I made her pose for it. She thought it was a riot. I thought she looked fabulous. :)

She is one of the most compassionate, empathetic people I know. She does not discriminate or judge. She gives you the benefit of the doubt even when you don't deserve it. She loves unfailingly. Anything I know of grace and unconditional love I have learned from my mother.

I was listening to Pandora the other day and a song popped up called "Virginia" by Ron Pope. I had never heard of this song or artist before, but I'm pretty sure he knows my mom:
"I grew up in the kind of place you have to pass
When traveling somewhere else
My mother laughed more than she cried
But when she cried
Well it was something everyone felt."
She is so kind and unassuming and genuine that you can't help but laugh when she laughs and cry when she cries. At least I can't. All my mother has to do is sniffle, even over the phone and I'm sobbing like an infant. And then she cries harder because I'm crying and in moments we've exhausted an entire box of tissues. It's probably good we don't live together anymore. Our natural resources might not survive it. We felled an entire forest the night we decided to watch Stepmom. What a mistake!

My mother is the portrait of selflessness. (Probably to an unhealthy degree, actually. But that's a conversation for another time). She would read to us almost every night. Even when she was exhausted. Sometimes the three of us would lay on my brother's bed while my mom fell asleep in the middle of one of Grimm's Fairy Tales. We would elbow her in the side saying things like "That's not how it ends!" and "Do the voices, mom!" Poor thing. Or sometimes--if she really wanted us to fall asleep--she would sit on the floor in the hallway that connected my room and my brother's and she would read to us both from there. She taught me to read, to write, to make dandelion bracelets and sandcastles, to do the monkey walk and sing a hundred silly folk songs from her childhood. She taught me to appreciate the little things in life like the sound of a mourning dove and the smell of lilacs.

My mother runs a small grocery store in an impoverished community in northern Michigan. The store was my father's entrepreneurial venture that she is now responsible for. The shelves are half bare and the tile on the floor is peeling up in places and the employees can't seem to get along... but the customers love my mother. Because she loves them.

She does not judge them for their meager situations. She helps them count their money because they never learned to. She asks them about their families, not because it's polite, but because she hopes they are well. She remembers the names of their children. She lets them take their milk and bread home and pay her later because their family is hungry and they don't get paid until Friday. I really don't know if the place has turned a profit in the decade and a half we have owned it--something is always broken, expired, stolen... And I honestly don't know how much longer she can keep it up... (Truthfully, I hope it's not much longer because she needs a break!) But I do know that the community is better for her presence. Not the store, her. You can get eggs and cheese anywhere, but she is invaluable.

I stumbled across a quote online that was credited to Mark Twain (but who knows, the site didn't look very legitimate). At any rate, it's a great one for my mom:
"A mother had a slender, small body, but a large heart--a heart so large that everybody's grief and everybody's joy found welcome in it, and hospitable accommodation."
This is so true of my mom. Where others in my life (*cough* my dad *cough cough*) have shown prejudice, bitter grudge holding, and conditional approval, my mother has been an unfailing example of wide open arms that bear acceptance, forgiveness, and unconditional love. I owe her everything.

I could ramble on about her attributes for days, but I'll spare you any additional gushing. Those of you who know her already know all of this because it is so apparent in her life. And those of you who don't know her will have less tolerance for long adorable stories about her :) So, I will leave you with an adorable picture or two of my mom and I over the years:


Just a bit of resemblance ;)