14 May A Mother’s Beauty

    I looked up at her, curling her long, sandy blond hair in the bathroom mirror and breathed in the scent of the canned hairspray and felt so…..safe and happy.  I caught her glance in the mirror and said “Mommy, you’re so beautiful!”  She laughed and said, “I love you.”  I miss her terribly.  Everything about her.  Her smell, her laugh, her very essence, and the way I felt whole around her.      Every year as Mother’s Day approaches I feel a mix of emotion.  I have a longing, aching emptiness for my own mom, gone too young at 42 after taking her own life tragically.  But I also have a blessed and grateful feeling for being a mom myself.  There is so much to be said about being so special to two young human beings and I am forever thankful.      Motherhood is infinitely unique.  It is truly a bond that can never be replicated. For years I never thought I even wanted children but now I definitely can’t imagine life without them.  All the good times, rough times, sleepless nights, sicknesses, milestones, all blur together in years of happy memories.      “Mommy, you’re so beautiful. “ My own daughter will sometimes tell me in the most unlikely moments how beautiful she thinks I am, and it’s usually when I haven’t done my hair or makeup and I know that she is actually more likely observing my internal qualities, my beauty inside, and how safe and happy she feels around ME, and there’s no other feeling like that in the world.    Whatever emotion this Mother’s Day brings you, I pray that God blesses you and brings you comfort and a spirit of gratitude at this time.

–Desiree