Mother's Day

2 years ago this Mother's Day, I sat in a huge leather chair and told my then six year old her father had passed away. As I sat rocking her crying little body, I was sad for her, pissed, and worried about how this was going to effect her life. Last week was the actual anniversary of Gary's death and I watched my now eight year old, walk confidently into an office and sit before a television producer, of an up and coming television show, and charm the pants off of her. This producer already had a preconceived notion of who Harmonie was because apparently, everyone that had previously met with her raved about her. Harmonie sat directly in front of this producer and behaved like a professional with a touch of eight year old flare. She spoke clearly and respectfully. There is no way you could tell that she really was nervous as hell. I'm so proud of my little dynamo. She has come so far since that faithful Sunday morning two years ago. She misses her papa a lot but she carries herself in a way that would make him so very proud. She has not allowed what her grandparents did or her father's death define her. I will proudly pat myself on the back for the hard work I have done, along with her therapist to teach her how to be this way. I know longer worry about how the death of her father will effect my favorite tiny human. I think that it has made her stronger and more resilient. She is amazing.

I told this story on Facebook last week. Here is the key note to all of this. Life happens. You win some and you lose some. We have good days and bad days. No matter what we have to be thankful and teach our kids to do the same. We have to demonstrate to our children how to live through these situations. This Mother's Day we did not go out. We did not have enough gas in the car to get very far. It happens. So we stayed home. I had a paper do and we had an appointment with Verizon to hook up our television's service so we would have a better TV experience. I had planned on baking with the kid but my paper and cleaning the house took all day. No worries! There is always tomorrow. I was given a card that was really funny and two scented candles. I heard that my daughter and my niece battled on which candle to get. My niece chose blue because it is my favorite color and my baby girl chose another candle because it smelled good and she thought I would like it more. The kid won out. She knows her mother well. She was pretty proud of that. Overall, it was a great Mother's Day for the time that we were given to live in this year. Next year we will do something better.

We must always take acceptance and joy in the time we are given and use it to our advantage. We may have spent this Sunday like any other Sunday, though it was a special day, but we did it with thankfulness. We have some a long way since that Mother's Day two years ago. We are both happy and full of spirit. We live on. We live through our freedom and appreciate every second of it. We try not to waste any moment. We are still working towards our greatness and enjoying every moment of the journey to get there.

Happy Belated Mother's Day!