Mother's Day

Usually Mother's Day is a pretty uneventful holiday for me.  Of course, it usually includes flowers or cards or calls to all of my favorites mothers.  But there's a feeling that accompanies a holiday that you only celebrate from "the outside looking in".  Like when you learn about the holidays celebrated in other cultures and religions and you go to parties and festivals to watch how they celebrate their own.  And sometimes you may eat a latke or run through plumes of chalky colors.  But you're still just observing--standing on the outside looking through the glass at the wonders of the many celebrations that are not your own.

I hadn't really thought much about this Mother's Day and how it relates to me until yesterday I received a card in the mail from a friend that said "Happy Mother's Day".  I had to pause for a minute to wonder if she sent it to the wrong person.  But then, as if she knew exactly what I was thinking, I felt a little squirm in my stomach and remembered that Motherhood is upon me.  Inside me.  Slowly peaking it's little light above the horizon.

So this year I feel slightly different about Mother's Day.  I feel like I've picked a new religion or been reborn in another country.  I feel like this year, I'm celebrating a whole new holiday:  one in which we honor the ones who carry life.  One measly little tiny second of eternity, nowhere near adequate enough, where we stop to say thanks to the person who birthed us, who carried us inside of her, who gave up wine and caffeine and wine and sky diving and wine and yoga inversions and wine for us.  The one who, at one time, had her own heart, and also yours, beating inside of her one body.

This year, as I feel this little one inside of me--another heart, another brain, another set of lungs, another pair of ears and eyes--growing and dancing and exploring, I am so very humbled and so extremely honored to be inducted into this new culture, the culture of mothers.

This Mother's Day, the most I can give to my own Mother and to the many mothers I love and admire, is my promise that I will spend every day of the rest of my life trying to live up to the amazing examples that you have set for me.  And continue to take at least a second of every day to stop and look around and remember what a mystery this all is, and how utterly miraculous that I, and everyone else wandering around here, came to be.

Have a wondrous weekend,
MEL

P.S. That's me today, about 26 weeks into the wild blue yonder.