I love Mother's Day. Rather, I loved Mother's Day. My tradition, in the past, was to have brunch with my immediate family, my mom and dad, and my brothers and their families. After brunch, I would go to the Indianapolis Museum of Art and peruse the art for about an hour. Then I would take my little camping chair and plant myself in a garden for hours, writing in my journal and gazing at the beautiful grounds. Now as a single mom, I knew I woudn't have that luxury, so I faced this day with a feeling of dread. My extended family had already celebrated Mother's Day a few weeks ago since my parents would be out of town today. It was a lovely day with the typical family stories, good food and sweet gifts exchanged. But today, well... today is different.
Like most things I fear, the reality is never quite as bad as the thought. Today I slept until 10. When I opened my eyes, my 11-year-old was standing next to me with a notepad in his hands reading me the daily breakfast specials. His 9-year-old brother was standing next to him with a homemade card and a store-bought card each of the boys had signed. When I received my delicious brown sugar and cinnamon pop-tart (one of the specials) and my glass of milk, my 7-year-old came in with two more homemade cards. Such sweetness made the dread slip right out of my body. Instead of doom and gloom, I felt joy and gratefulness.
I wish the 13-year-old was present, but the x-box game he was playing trumped my breakfast in bed. I forgave him. But not without using the Mother's Day guilt trip to get him to do all sorts of things around the house.
My husband is now here, installing the boys air conditioning units in their bedrooms. In a 110-year-old house, even one that's been rehabbed, the upstairs doesn't get the nice cool air pumped in as well as it does downstairs. So, he showed up to put the units in and clean the freezing cold pool. Another nice Mother's Day surprise.
I'm finding that every "first" is difficult in this new life of an almost divorced woman, like this first Mother's Day on my own. But I'm thankful that there will never be another first Mother's Day as a singe mom again.
Now, I'm off to create a new Mother's Day tradition... grabbing my four mop-headed boys and heading to Butler University for a little family game of baseball. Go Team MOM.