It's (darn-near) Mother's Day. Holla at me now.

At a recent monthly meeting that I manage (the same meeting I call from the heartbreaking comfort of my bed big-scary-monstah-meeting), my awesome co-chair began the ice-breaker.

Now, before anyone e-frowns, I’m all about ice-breakers, on-boardings, and any other hyphenated collaboration of creativity and wit to a burdensome process. I am however not as clutch with the icebreakers, and so dear colleague began:

“As we are approaching mother’s day, this is a good opportunity to share what about our own mothers have we inherited, gained, or what about the relationship has supported who we are today”

See. I couldn’t have done that. And so dear colleague shares fun and poignant story. I go next, nearly reciting verbatim my previous blog entry about my 2 year old and Mummi. A few coworkers others share. It’s really some-kinda-gorgeous the variety we get.

But one person doesn’t share. And she doesn’t have to. And I feel terrible that she’s on the spot. And I feel good that she says what she does “I’ll pass.” She was and is entitled to do so.

Holidays can be hard. Before my blog-days my own were decently shitty. I was very lonely sometimes, and other times not so much, but annoyed at the expectation. Hurt by the expectation. All kinds of crap by the expectation.

And even now that I’m less annoyed and more joyous to the point of bubbling over, my story isn’t exactly what folks may have had in mind when discussing mother’s day… I mean, it started with “As many of you know, or well, know now, my mom has a mental illness and it characterized how I grew up. It impacted our reality…” and my ending that my own two year old gets the true version of Nana having a certain kind of day post-episode wasn’t exactly what they wanted to conclude with. #Kanyeshrug I've said this before, but we are as we are made.

Ultimately, what folks can’t say (in general) with the same level of pride I can (most days) is that: I have the onliest Mama who wore mink coats (from who knows where) to the grocery when we bought spam in the lean-late-80s.So, well, holla at me now.

That, and of course: if you celebrate it, if you beleive it in, if it works for you and yours: HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!