By: Jen Wainwright
My kids and I were snuggled on the couch, talking about our upcoming holiday plans. It’s all so exciting to me, really!
We’ll make cookies with close family friends, a tradition my best friend and I began the year our oldest daughters were born. And we’ll get into our van and drive around listening to Christmas carols, sipping hot cocoa while we “ooh and ahh” over the lights around town.
We’ll pick up this gift for this person, we’ll make this one for that person, we’ll…
“What’s the best gift you’ve ever gotten, Mama?” my daughter asks me with her big, blue eyes, reflections of my very own.
“Yeah, mom! What is it, what is it?”
That year, I was home from college for the holidays, and my mom (professional procrastinator, I do believe) had me last-minute shopping with her at the mall two days before Christmas. Crowded, messy. People wandering about with dazed looks on their faces, mania glinting in their eyes – still looking for “that something to buy” that might bring joy.
In and out of droves of people and stores, my mom “just needed to get a pair of holiday socks for Aunt…she always loves the socks I get her, and…” We ended up at J.C. Penney’s at 9:30 with the zombies…er, last-minute holiday shoppers, found the socks, and left (finally exhausting the to-do list, and ourselves).
The next morning – Christmas Eve! – I awoke to, “I’ve just got to stop to Kroger to get…to make the dish to bring to…”My love of the season was slowly-but-surely choking on the details, my joy plummeting down her seemingly-never-ending holiday to-do list.
Dutiful daughter, I found myself in the aisles of Kroger on Christmas Eve morning. And, of course, as I was in a 23-year-old “what’s the point of all of this?” mood, I bumped into a classmate from high school.
Standing with my mom in the aisle, I prepared for the, “Heeeeeyyyy. How are yoooooouuu?” conversation that must take place between high school chums, years later – “How many kids do you have? What do you do for a living?” It’s a beautiful-and-awkward-at-the-same-time conversation, yes?
Yet this particular friend was an old friend of mine. We’d been best buddies in grade school, and drifted apart as kids do. But she had spent many a’night at my house, and I at hers. She knew my mom, I knew hers. We shared fifth grade memories, roller skating and crushes on boys.
“Oh, hiiii,” she said, turning toward me with a big smile.
Just as I was saying my “Hiiiiii”, her face…her smile…dropped.
She looked at me, and at my mom…and she just…Broke. Down. She began to sob.
I grabbed her, and hugged her as she cried…in the aisle of Kroger…no words.
When we finally let go, she started wiping her eyes, and said, “My mom passed, Jen…It’s the first time I’ve ever bought the holiday ham…it’s…she’s not here…”
That Christmas Eve morning was more than 10 years ago, yet I think of her every holiday season… I’m sure my old friend has no idea that bumping into her that day at surely one of the darkest times in her life left one of the most powerful impressions on me of love that I’ve ever experienced.
My heart bled for her…Walking out of the store that day, I’d never been more grateful just to be walking next to my mom, tackling her holiday to-do’s together. Or more aware that one day, I wouldn’t…
In the years since, I’ve held the hand and felt the hurt in my heart for others, too, who have lost their mothers. And I think of them each holiday season, and feel truly grateful for each one I still have with mine, each holiday she says she’s “skipping it all this year” only to end up presenting the perfect little something to each person around her, a little piece of the heartfelt way she does things.
In the years since, I’ve also become a mom. And now, I, too, carry a long to-do list and tackle the holiday must-haves of the holiday season. I know that a large part of the way I create holidays for my own children comes from the way she created them for me. And she’s always right there, by my side, helping…helping.
We are all given but one – one mom. And your mom is always your mom. And whether present in day-to-day life, or alive only in your heart in spirit – your mom is and will always be with you. She is the one who taught you to love, through her love for you. She is the helping voice in your head, the laugh you know by heart. She is the guiding hand as you cook a family meal or heal your sick children, as she did you. She is your memories. She is your future. She is a forever, irreplaceable part of you.
“The best gift I’ve ever gotten?” I said to my kids. “Oh, that’s an easy one.”
“I get to be your Mom.”
JEN’S ZEN
— Because the damn dishes are never done. Laundry is a cruel joke. And because children are beautiful lessons in Patience and Counting. 10, 9, 8, 7 Breathe…
Jen is a freelance writer, parent to three, and she’s been a stepparent for over 15 years. She is well-equipped to discuss and write about the great, and the not-so-great, details of all-things-parenting. Along with spending quality time with her family, Jen enjoys music, chocolate, camping and relaxing. And laughing!