The Good Enough Mothers' Day

There are certain holidays I simply refuse to participate in.

Let’s take Easter for example. Hate the whole dress parade. I will indulge in chocolate marshmallow eggs, however. And, while I celebrate the original reason we have Bunny Day to start with, I can’t (even with my fertile imagination) figure out how we ever got from an empty tomb to a basket of candy delivered by an oversized rodent.

Marti Gras. Not flashing these girls for a string of beads. Nuh uh.

Not big on St. Paddy’s day. Beer isn’t supposed to be green and I can only come up with so many good reasons to have a hangover. Leprechauns aren’t one of them.

Ahhhh and then there’s mothers day.

It is so far from a celebratory event, I won’t even capitalize it.

And since this is an anonymous (well sort of anonymous) blog, and since I’ve never been known for being circumspect, I’m going to say the thing that every single mother out there has thought at one point in time or another:

                I Am Not A Good Mother.

Good Mothers are selfless.

I’m not selfless. I confess. I have eaten the best pieces of fried chicken, the fluffiest rolls, the edges off the cobbler that have the gooey syrupy fruit baked right into the crust so they taste like a cookie-pie… all before they ever made it to the table. I’m a food-thief. I have taken food from my children’s mouths.

Good Mothers always place themselves last.

Not when it comes to standing in line for the potty after a four hour drive. This bladder’s played the trampoline for three fetus-sized humans. It goes first, one way or the other. Preferably in the bathroom.

Good Mothers don’t stand sideways when they look in the mirror and think “This wasn’t here before I had kids, dang it.”

They also don’t look at their kids and think, “Who are you? And why are you not perfect?”

Good Mothers are fluffy and comfortable to sit on and they wear glasses with a chain around the neck. Their houses smell of vanilla and they drive the neighborhood around like a chauffeur in capris and sweater sets and are always on time and never forget their children.

I forgot my children once.

It was on mothers’ day, ironically. The last mothers’ day I ever darkened the doors of a church. After a hectic morning of dressing four small spider monkeys, I threw on my own clothes and loaded the van with the potluck and diaper bags and purses and Bibles and enjoyed the long quiet drive to church with my well behaved brood. Except when I got to church…well, two of the four were missing.

Which would explain the peaceful journey.

You know, that one is worth repeating.

Good Mothers don’t forget their children.

I will never forget my son at five, asking me to dance on the freshly cut lawn.

Or my daughter, at 17, going to prom with a strawberry colored armpit because I couldn’t manage to work the depilatory process.

Or my other son, riding up behind me in the canyon, pausing his horse beside mine, saying, “Thanks for letting us grow up to be men, Mom.”

Or the surgeon, who, while removing the bullet from one sons’ rear end, looked at me and said, “So, you homeschool and you have 3 kids. Which means, 33.3% of your students just shot 33.3% of your students?”

That stuff doesn’t happen to Good Mothers.


But, you know, I wasn't a Bad Mother, either. I didn't sell my children's toys to buy drugs. For that matter, I didn't sell my children, either. 

I guess it's this: My kids deserved the crème de la crème. They deserved Martha Stewart and Donna Reed and Mary the Mother of Jesus all rolled into one. They deserved the best. Because they are amazing and smart and beautiful and compassionate, caring humanoids that somehow survived being raised by Lucille Ball and Carole Burnett and all Three Stooges.

So there: That’s why I hate mothers day.

Because I am not the mother I wanted to be. I’m not the Good Mother. But, apparently, I am the Good Enough Mother.

Can we have a Good Enough Mothers’ Day? I could rock that one. I might even circle it on the calendar.

Heck, I might even wear beads.


So this one's for all you other Good Enough Mothers out there....


I love ya!