Happy Birthday, Mom

Tomorrow, Oct. 30, is my mom's birthday. I won't say which birthday exactly, because I don't want to get whacked with a wooden spoon! Let's just say she's been around long enough to well deserve the title of family matriarch.

My mom has what I believe to be a diagnosable disorder in which she feels the need to feed people, and to make sure they have a jacket (even when it's 105 degrees, her kids will say.) Long before Subarus and hybrids sported bumper stickers instructing people to Commit Random Acts of Kindness, Mom was living that advice.

When I was a kid, my sister sold her car.  A young couple, barely out of their teens, had been lured to Utah with the promise of jobs, which never materialized. Now broke, expecting their first baby in a couple of weeks, and all alone in a strange place, all they wanted was a car to get them home to Tennessee, where his uncle had a job for him. It didn't matter how many other people expressed interest in the car, we all knew my mom was going to make sure they got it.

When they came to pick it up, the young man mustered all the courage he had, meekly looked at my dad and almost whispered that they were short the full amount.  Now, my dad is a good and decent man. The best, actually. But business is business and there were other buyers, who did have the full amount. Nevertheless, without uttering a single word, mom just looked at him, and he told them they could send the rest of the money when they got back to Tennessee. As they were leaving, Mom gave them a sack fill of food, and a baby present. My dad just laughed. (Oh, my sister is still waiting for the $10!)

Flash forward a decade to a time when Vietnamese "boat people" refugees were settling in Utah. Every day about the same time, Mom saw a family with a couple of young kids walking by the dentist officer where she worked. As winter approached and it grew colder, she noticed the kids weren't wearing coats. So one day, Mom followed them home. She knocked on the door and asked if the kids had coats. She discovered that the sweaters they wore were what they had. That was it. She put the mom and kids in the car, took them to Grand Central, and bought them all coats.

She's just that kind of person, and in my oh-so-humble opinion, everyone who knows her is the better for it.

Happy birthday to honestly, one of the most inspiring, unassuming, loving and kind women I've ever known: my mom.