GRANDMA P…

Even though it’s Mother’s Day, I cannot say that I learned everything I need to know from my mother. After all, Father’s Day is just around the corner. Still, so much of what I know that is of real value, I learned, or in most cases am still trying to learn, from my mother.

So I write and dedicate the rest of this post to you, Grandma P.

After twenty years of formal education, I can honestly say, the best and most valuable lessons I have learned were taught to me by you, Mom, or more accurately, by your example.

A Sense of Humor

You’ve shown me how finding opportunities for laughter and lightheartedness can bring a vibrancy to life that is so easy to miss in what otherwise feels like a pendulum swing between the difficult and the mundane. Perhaps more importantly, your willingness to laugh at yourself has had immeasurable value in my life. Being able to laugh at myself has often snatched me from the grip of deepening despair.

A Genuine Work Ethic

Everything I have accomplished that holds value to me came because I worked for it. I am far from perfect in this regard, but you have provided me a perfect example to strive for. Whether it was housework, employment, volunteering or my last minute school project, you have demonstrated to me over and over what it means to work.

Compassion

I cannot think of any other person in this world who is more willing and able to genuinely feel the trials and suffering of others. I can recall what seem to be countless neighbors, friends and family members to whom you offered a listening ear, a gentle word or a warm embrace. And how often I have seen others gratefully take your offering shows just how sincerely you care for others.

Longsuffering

You have certainly had your share of adversity in life. I cannot recall seeing you indulge in self-pity for more than a brief moment. Throughout my life you have demonstrated a strength and a resiliency that has shown me how to get up, brush myself off and keep going after stumbling and falling beneath the weight of my own trials.

Being a Worrywart

Yes, I have learned from the best how to worry. While this attribute does carry with it a certain amount of digestive instability, it has also served to keep me grounded. You have taught me that there are certain things in this life that deserve being worried over. I have watched you anguish over things that seemed to me to be beyond your ability to control or even influence. Sometimes you proved me wrong and found a way to influence the situation. More importantly to me, you always seemed to emerge at the end of the process with a new found strength and calmness. While I wish I were better at parsing the important and trivial things I worry over, I have come to appreciate the value of taking the time and effort to wrestle long enough with a problem to actually learn a lesson from it.

Service

Over the years you have provided me an unwavering example of service to others. I have watched as you served with uncommon diligence in every calling you received in the church. When it comes to the service you render for others, the extra mile is really just the beginning. On top of that, you have done it in a quiet humility that I have rarely, if ever, seen in another.

Having started this, I now realize I will never be able to write something that does justice to what your example has meant to me. There are simply no words that will adequately convey to you, Mom, the love and gratitude I feel for you. Thank you so much for all you do and all you are. Happy Mother’s Day.

Love,
Your Son