Happy Birthday, Mom!

Tomorrow is my mom's 50th birthday. I know that a lady shouldn't reveal another lady's age, especially not on the World Wide Web, and we're all supposed to pretend that my mom is turning "twenty-nine", but my mother would be the first person to tell you that her life was only beginning at twenty-nine, for that was the year she became a mother. 

My mom is a lot of wonderful things: daughter, sister, aunt, friend, cook, worker. She is a strong and beautiful person, and I don't know of a single individual who isn't completely smitten with her. Even though she excels in many areas, everyone knows that "mother" is the title that suits her best. I know every girl thinks her mother is the best, most perfect one, but you have to believe me that mine really is. It's the role she was born to fill; it's the one thing that she will always, always be.

My mom has always known that she wanted to be a mother, and she's the reason that I decided to have children of my own someday. She has been an amazing role model, and I know it must have sometimes been difficult to make it always look easy. It's hard to articulate how much all the cooking, cleaning, organizing, listening, teaching, doting, and disciplining she did mean to me. I have friends who have told me stories of their relationships with their mothers or things their mothers have said or done that have made me actually cry tears of gratitude that I am lucky enough to have the mother that I do; the one with all the unconditional love and the unending heart.

Happy Birthday, Mom. I love you the most.