1) Make him feel loved, nurtured, and taken care of every single day
2) Be there when he is sick or upset and tend to his wounds
3) Make his favorite breakfast every day (with the understanding that his “favorite” will change on a routine basis)
4) Sacrifice her own needs and desires to make sure that her son’s needs and desires are met (without ever telling her son that she made sacrifices)
5) Having a complete homemade dinner ready every single night – other than the occasional pizza night
6) Ensuring that his clothes are clean for school every day
7) Completely washing, drying, and ironing his entire baseball uniform between games of a double header – in plenty of time to get him back to the field for the 2nd game
8) Shooting him a couple of extra bucks when he goes out on a date in high school even though the son never asked – she just knows
9) Somehow finding the funds – when funds are really tight – to purchase the professional drum set of his dreams – a drum set that he could then use to put himself through college, pay for gas and miscellaneous expenses, and even tuck away some cash for the future
10) Getting his drum set to the football field and unloading it by herself while her son practices with the high school band
11) Somehow finding the funds to send him to a jazz camp in Indiana, providing transportation to get him there, returning mid-week to deliver his own drums because he thought that he needed them, and then returning at week’s end to watch his concert, load the drums, and get him home
12) Making sure that he had a nice new suit for his first music gig
13) Never missing one of his endeavors, baseball, basketball, bowling, concerts, etc. - always there in the front row
15) Being there to celebrate every single victory, both no-hitters, every hit and homerun, every basket, every strike, and every musical note and still be willing to listen to him re-tell the stories of his endeavors on their way home and at home
16) When her son grows up – watching her grandchildren while her son and wife go away for the weekend – many times
17) Allowing him to get a dog when she really didn’t want one – and then also falling in love with the dog – and nurturing the dog in his final days after her son marries and moves away
18) Always telling her son that she has high aspirations for him in life and reassuring him that he will succeed as long as he works hard
19) Making him a full breakfast at 3:00 a.m. when her son gets home from a gig and is starving
20) Cooking complete dinners and delivering them to his home after he gets married, so that he and his wife will not have to cook late at night after returning home from work and night college classes
21) Always sensing when her son is under stress or duress and encouraging him to slow down and take a deep breath
22) Being supportive with her grandchildren – her son’s children – even when she might wish to give them a kick in the pants
23) Befriending her son’s wife through the years even though they did not always see eye-to-eye at the beginning stages of their relationship
24) Falling in love with her son’s new dog and becoming inseparable with the dog when they are together
25) When facing testing for her upcoming cancer surgery – telling her son to go to work and not worry .. she’ll take a cab to the hospital
That’s right! Those 25 items describe my own mom, but they only scratch the surface!
To the best mother in the world – THANK YOU, MOM! If my kids someday consider me to be as great a parent as you – my life's mission will be completed. Thank you for the lessons on being a great parent!
Paul W. Reeves
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