And when the day is done...

My Momma’s still my biggest fan…



That is a line from a Jessica Andrews song that was popular several years ago, and it came to mind when my mom signed up to be my first stalker follower.

Although does it count when I was sitting next to her showing her how to sign up?

Seriously, my mom is a ‘kick in the butt’… and she is one of my best girlfriends, loudest cheerleaders and greatest mentor!



Okay honestly...

YES!

She is still my mom, and we still have ‘those’ moments

(can you hear my eyes roll?)

but anyone who is a mom knows that it is an occupation that you never really retire from.

(Nor would many of us want to).

But I have to say that as I have gotten older grown up matured gone through life and become a mom myself the relationship that her and I have has really evolved into something wonderful.



When I was married, through circumstances I became separated from her and she had every right to turn me away when I came crying at her doorstep about the SHOCK of what lead to the end of my marriage…but she embraced me, and supported me (financially too) and held me up so many times that…she was literally my LEANING POST

(inside joke mom…do you get it!?).

So can I tell you how AweSome she is…I mean besides all that stuff I just said…?



When she married my father (The Captain), she left her home with 5 other sisters to move several 1000s of miles away. In the first few years, two babies showed up and her husband is called up to go overseas…she learns to drive, volunteers at the Red Cross AND takes care of two little ones in the midst of horrible politics that ‘attack’ families of military members.


I remember very clearly wondering why protestors where egging our car and yelling that our dad was a ‘baby-killer’, while sitting next to my baby sister. Although I cannot recall what Mom said, it was positive and comforting enough that I felt safe and secure with her…I now know that she was even more confused and frightened, didn’t these people understand that danger HER husband was in, what would happen to her babies if something happened to HIM?

I remember being in elementary school when she joined the Air Force herself,

YES! My mom wore combat boots!

She built a solid career and fought for that career when others wished to demean and threaten her and her family.

I remember her creativity when it came to my sister’s and mine various struggles…how to make Easter fun when one of your children can’t have chocolate…

By the way, Carob and sugar free has changed SO much in the last 20 years.

Hey…wanna know a great deterrent against experimenting with drugs as a teenager?

When your mom is packing HEAT as a DEA liaison!

Just Say “NO!” was easy with that realization.

Don't get me wrong, like I said before we have our rough patches

(HELLO, she is still my MMMMAAAAHHHHOOOMMMM),

and honestly we still do…but they really pale when I think about how she has always been there…during the great moods and the crappy ones

(hers and mine!)

Now that I am a mom…I value her all the more…especially at times as a single parent, when you need to have ‘back up’ against a protesting teenager.

(It is a family trait that we don’t allow our kids to “hang out” at the mall.)

But I also value her ‘ear’…am I doing the right thing…I don’t understand this in that paperwork…can you help me…MOVE our house…in 15 days…during the kids Spring Break...

HELP!! PLEASe!!!


I realize that I ask SO much of her…SO very much of her and I just hope that being the ‘biggest’ fan has great benefits…

and that I can become the woman, the mom that she is to me, for my children.

Image by Maury Shulman, do NOT COPY!

To say "THANK YOU", really seems to lack the feelings I truly mean…

but remember Mom, I promised you long ago to make certain the nurses at your assisted living home were HOTTIES…and I am certain even then you could teach them lots.

hahaha-snort-hahaha

So I guess you could say that when the day is done I am my momma's biggest fan!