mom

Mom hadn't met Ramon; her advocacy was more arm's length - petitions, the website, letter writing, meetings with politicians. Her friend Hanna had formed a close friendship with Ramon though, visiting him as often as she could. Hanna told me that Ramon's greatest regret was that he wouldn't get to see his daughter grow up.And Jeremy's dad, who had that opportunity, was just throwing it away.It made me furious, and I couldn't let it go.

This girl who's slept a hundred years has something after all. It's called Centuryitis, and it has turned me into a man. Oh, what will mamma think when she sees me?!-Karen Quan and Jarod Kintz

For my mum, to whom I'd turn in a heartbeat.

I hate when I'm not done with my cup but my mom decides to put it in the dishwasher anyway and the cup isn't dishwasher safe. I keep telling my mom that my origami coffee mugs are hand wash ONLY. Handshakes are also hand wash only.-Karen Quan and Jarod Kintz

I remember our childhood dayswhen life was easyand math problems hard.Mom would help us with our homeworkand dad was not at home but at work.After our chores, we__ go to the old fort museum with clips in our hair and pure joy in our hearts.You, sister, wore the bangles thatyou, brother, got as a prize from the Dentist.__hy the bangles?_ the Dentist asked, surprised, for boys picked the stickers of cars instead.__hey__e for my sisters,_ you said.Mom would treat us to a bottle of Coke,a few sips each. Then,we__ buy the sweet smelling bread from the same white vanand hand-in-hand,we__ walk to our small flat above the restaurant.I remember our childhood days.Do you remember them too?

Every parent is an artist, for the bared canvas of a newborn__ soul begs for the artist__ touch. And because this is so, a parent must prepare the palette with the utmost care, choose the brushes with poised caution, and mindfully attend to every brushstroke regardless of how slight. And such caution is utterly imperative for the emerging rendering will be both a legacy borne of the parent, and a life lived by the child.

With the gentle force of their words, the dogged warmth of their embrace, and the assuring touch of souls softly bared, mothers are silently shaping whole societies and authoring entire cultures that sit poised on the horizon of the future. And although we ignorantly relegate such roles to some lower caste status, we would be wise to understand that the role of a mother sets the cadence of the future.

A parent holds within their hands the gift of a child to which they must expend the gift of themselves. And in such a monumental outpouring, the parent will lose both the child and the gifts given, but they will possess the far greater gift of knowing that they gave both.

One of a mother__ greatest gifts is to teach her child that to grow is not to timidly sit on some safe shore at water__ edge and clumsily grab whatever happens to float by. Rather, it is to deliberately step into waters both calm and turbulent in order to wrestle great things to shore. And that lesson can be best taught by a mother who stands before her child dripping wet.

All too soon the garden of childhood is paved cold with the asphalt roads of adulthood. And while it is not within her power to halt this unrelenting progression, a mother can diligently guard this most precious garden and insure that the roads become gentle paths that wind through it instead of byways that kill it.

Chilled ice tea that tempered tepid summer days lathered thick with humidity. Frothy hot chocolate that cut winter__ chill. Bedtime prayers that sent our fears scrambling in panicked flight. Golden bouquets of dandelions aromatically rich with the gift of summers scent. Family meals that wove yet another binding thread in and through the tapestry of those seated around the table. These are but the slightest sampling of the innumerable gifts my mother handed to this child of hers. And without them, my life would be impoverished beyond words to describe.

Amanda, you finally decided to answer the phone,_ her mom exclaimed after picking up at the first ring. __here__e you been, what__e you been up to?___om, do you remember when I was a kid, I had a friend, he was a Personification of the Sydney Tar Ponds, sort of my imaginary friend?_ Mandy asked.__o, what in the name of god are you on about?_ her mom sighed in exasperation.__emember? Only I could see him, but he was real and he was my best friend when I was eighteen?_ Mandy insisted.__o, I don't remember Alecto Sydney Steele at all,_ said her mom all too quickly.

The child you hold in your arms is your gift to a future that you will not see. Therefore, we must turn a blind eye to ourselves and selflessly pour the best of ourselves into our children while rigorously sifting out the worst of ourselves. And once we are utterly spent by such daring gestures, we will shockingly discover the resulting emptiness as astonishingly filled.

Sometimes you just need the comforts of home, the familiarity of your own family bed and only the pampering a mother can do.

Whosoever does not believe in the existence of a sixth sense has clearly not regarded their own mother. How it is they know all they know about you, even those secrets you locked away so tightly in the most hidden compartments of your heart, remains one of the great mysteries of the world. And they don't just know__hey know instantly.

She expected a lot of me. When I was in fourth grade working on a book report, she made me start the whole thing over when she read it and said it was barely even legible. "What's wrong with it?" I asked her. "It's not good enough yet. You have to try harder," she said, her voice gentle. "You have to try hard at everything you do. That's all I ask." I rolled my eyes and revised it, and over time her approach wore off on me and I became like her too - wanting to do my best, expecting my best.

IN the book of my heart, pages keep falling out, many of them marked "Mom and Dad.

When a mother elevates her communication, she naturally elevates the outcomes of her child's life since a mother's words become her child's universe of possibilities.