While at college, one of the activities Bud has participated in is tutoring young students at a local grade school… most of whom use English as a second language.  Bud lights up when he talks about his involvement with this project.   You can tell this has been fulfilling for him.  Though  he’s never complained, I know he’s had to overcome obstacles to be part of this service project.  I get the impression it’s one of those situations where there is so much work to be done, but so few people to do it, organization often falls through the cracks.  Bud has shown up to assist many times and encountered semi-chaos…. no one in charge, no one there at all, no one aware that Bud or his peers were coming.  But, that’s OK.  Bud dove in anyway and went back and back over and over.  He got to be with kids and Bud has a way with kids.

Bud and I were just now playing Mario Kart and I spotted a handwritten note on his floor.  Here is what it said verbatim: 

Dear mr.zach it was fun Play With you I will Pock you ugen Next Week I am.  a crishtin too.  — best friend, Mario

Apparently, Bud teased the kids about poking them, thus the “pock”.   The most amazingly cute thing ever?  Mario is a chrishtin.  How wonderful is that?

Wonderful about today:

• Planting flowers – SweetGuy is, in my opinion, a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to home projects.  Well, maybe just a really bad worrier about not doing things right.  Is there a difference?  He measured the flower beds multiple times, created (I kid you not) a spreadsheet, fashioned a couple of layout guides out of PVC, laid out all the flowers and finally planted.  Me, I tossed them in the air and planted them where they landed.  Think we should work to meet somewhere in the middle?  Nahhhh.
• Even-ing up the dessert – At an age where I began to care about calories — teenagerish I guess — someone in my family stated the glorious rule that if you don’t take an entire piece of a dessert then there are no calories to be counted.  Thus, you only take a bite, a nibble, a smidgen.  As an extra incentive (read: excuse) to take said bite you would note that the dessert was a little uneven in its cutting.  You would do the world a favor by slicing off just enough sweet stuff to make the cut even.  Bud, Magoo, and I took turns even-ing the dessert over and over again tonight until Magoo really took matters into her own hand by lunging her fork right into the middle of the whole cake.  Thus, assuring us all unended even-ing and non-caloric partaking of cake.
• Not shaving the beard – Bud hasn’t shaved in four days.  Magoo cannot seem to look at him without uttering the words “Shave your beard.”  She is obsessing over it.  I’m fairly certain that for every time she said those words, she convinced Bud even more to keep it.
• Is Dustin, or isn’t he? – We’ve got a delightful young man coming to stay with us for part of the summer, and possibly for all of next year so he can graduate in the States.  His family currently resides overseas.  I liken Dustin to a puppy.  He is adorable, good-natured, makes you smile constantly, and hyper, hyper, hyper.   We don’t know for sure yet if he will be here, and probably won’t until it really happens.  Dustin=unpredictable=delightful. 
• BirdKiller = mothkiller.  Oh my, that cat can hunt.  We were all gathered in the gazebo when a HUGE moth appeared fluttering around the torches.  Honestly, when I first saw it, I was pretty sure it was a bat.  It was that big.  Our hunter cat, BirdKiller, came racing over, tracked it for all of about 10 seconds, followed it off into the shadows, and had it in her clutches just. like. that.  She is a beast.
• Cubs win.  Whoosh.  It’s been a long weekend of extra inning losses.
• Funfetti – Bud went to the store to fetch some ingredients for supper including something sweet to eat.  Yeah, er, why is it I can’t lose that extra weight?  Anyway, we told him to get whatever looked good for dessert.  He returned with a boxed Funfetti cake mix.  Looking at Magoo’s reaction, you would have thought he did something genuinely disgusting – like messed her hair up.  She was incredulous.  How could he POSSIBLY not get something chocolate.  Poor girl, she’s spent three straight days studying for finals, and now she was expected to drown her sorrows in some sort of white cake?  Horrors.  Thankfully, cocoa saved the day.  Add a bit of it to Funfetti batter, and you have a lovely chocolate treat.  Close call.  Very close call.
• Sleeping in, and for Bud — REALLY sleeping in.  He went to bed at 1:30 AM.  Got up at 1:30 PM.  Scratch that — was GOTTEN up at 1:30 PM.  The guy knows how to relax.
• Update:  Bud shaved the beard at about midnight.  Sorry I am.  One less thing to mess with Magoo over.  So sad.

I’ve known from a pretty young age that my Mom was not your typical Midwestern suburban mother.  There were a few things that differentiated her a bit — things like being a working mother before it was the norm, moving away from her small town roots when her six siblings stayed put — but those aren’t the things that made me know she was different.  The eccentricities of Mom were more along the variety of dancing on tables and tricking lounge bands into letting her take hold of the microphone (before the days of karaoke) when she knew she definitely could NOT sing. 

Just a few years ago, when Mom was well into her 60s, we attended a family wedding together.  She did, of course, sing and dance crazy at the wedding.  But, she was just getting started.  The extended family gathered in Mom & Dad’s hotel room after the reception shut down.  SweetGuy and I couldn’t keep up her pace and retired to our hotel room next to hers.  I recall falling asleep to the sounds of my Mom singing New York, New York reverberating through the walls of my hotel room.  I smiled and put a pillow over my head.  We found out the next day that a security guard was called to ah, quiet the revelers.  Mom good naturedly accused me of calling security.  I must admit it crossed my mind, but I did not.  How different it is, though, that my 60 something Mom was busted by security. 

She was also busted for going too fast on her jet ski… at 64 years old.  Wow, I love my Mom.  How cool is that.   I will admit that I didn’t always enjoy the attention my Mom garnered.  But, I do now.  Cause she’s not just crazy, she makes people feel great.  I understand the difference.  She makes everyone around her feel better about themselves and their surroundings.  You can’t help but smile when you are around my Mom.  She is priceless.

Crazy (in a good way) she is, but weak she is not.  Mom raised four kids when she was often effectively a single Mom as Dad travelled very frequently.  She moved us more times than I can keep up with… 12, 13, maybe 14 times.   After us kids were grown, Mom helped every one of us establish houses and, more importantly, homes.  She has been there for us in anything we have ever needed.  She battled breast cancer, and now lymphoma with resiliency and laughter.  She is THE best.

As hard as it has been to watch Dad go through what he did, in ways it’s almost harder now watching Mom, who is a widow after 51 memorable years.  She is lost without him.  She isn’t lost because he wrote the bills, or changed the light-bulbs, or drove the car.  She is lost because they were best friends and even after 51 years they thoroughly enjoyed each other’s company every single day.  She WILL be OK, because she is just that strong, but it still hurts deep in my heart to watch her go through this.  None of us can take this grief from her.

On this Mother’s Day, I just need to say that it is a privilege, honor, and blessing to be a Mom, and a privilege, honor, and blessing to be a daughter of a unique and fabulously wonderful Mother.