1: Thank you, Mum

Even though I had the idea to restart the Year of Being Thankful yesterday, I waited until today to actually begin. Why? Because today is Mother's Day and there is nothing in my life I am more thankful for than my mother. This is the right day to begin. Everything flows from this.

My mother was born in a small town in eastern Ontario to working-class parents. She grew up with the values of people who lived through the Great Depression. She grew up with her parents' example of a strong work ethic. She met and married my father in that small town, and then moved here to Ottawa to be closer to his work. A year or so later, I was born and my brother followed three years after that.

I may not have had the mostly-traditional upbringing that my mother had, but I certainly benefited from her experience as a small-town girl with a strong mother of her own. Growing up in the sixties with a working mom meant, thankfully, that the concept of "women in their place" was utterly foreign to me. It never ever occurred to me that I couldn't have been a doctor or a lawyer or a paleontologist or anything else I might have wanted to be.

And even though she worked a lot, and wasn't always there when we came home from school, she managed to instill in me a set of values that anyone would be proud of. Decency, humility, generosity, honesty, kindness...whatever I have of those qualities, I got from her.

When I decided I wanted to go to art school, she was behind me all the way, never for a moment doubting my ability to succeed in whatever I wanted to do. She and my step-father put me through college and never asked to be repaid, so I didn't graduate with a huge debt on my shoulders like so many other graduates do.

My mother believed in me then, and she still does. She supports me. She cheers my successes and tempers my failures with wisdom and understanding. She worries about me too. Sometimes I get frustrated by her concerns, but then I think about how I'd feel if no one worried about me, and my frustration vanishes. She even proves that being a mom is a never-ending job, because children, no matter how old they get, still sometimes need mothering, correcting, teaching and just simply the knowledge that Mom is out there somewhere loving you.

All my glories and my successes are thanks to her. All the goodness in me is because she is so good and I absorbed that goodness with her blood in the womb and with her unfailing, unconditional love ever since.  If I am good, the credit goes to her. If I am ever not good, it's because I didn't listen to her.

There is nothing and no one on this planet I am more grateful for. So today, on Mother's Day, I dedicate this year-long blog to my mother, Julie, because if I was only allowed to be grateful for one thing in this life, it would be her.

I love you, Mum. Happy Mother's Day.
xoxo