Dear Mom,
I'm sorry I didn't remember to bring a card. I know how that hurt you and I hope you know that I never meant for that to happen. I want you to know that Hallmark has yet to make the appropriate sized card for everything I'd like to say and thank you for. I know we haven't always seen eye-to-eye. In fact, I know we rarely do. There is almost an irony to the fact that two English majors struggle so much with something that seems as simple as communication. I want you to know that even then – when we seem two worlds apart, two generations away, or 100 miles from one another – I am thankful for you every minute of every day.
I am thankful for you even on the days I have three missed calls and five texts from you on my phone. I am thankful for you in the mornings when you text me Bible verses before school. I am thankful for our two minute conversations between classes when all I do is complain about taking the bus. Above all, I am so thankful to call you – the strongest woman I know – Mom.
I am sorry I was a handful growing up. Thank you for loving me when I didn't know how to love myself. Thank you for letting me learn from my own mistakes and reminding me it was all going to be okay in the end. I thought I knew it all when I was 15, you knew I didn't know the half of it. Thank you for reinforcing the fact that fighting fire with fire only makes a bigger fire. Thank you for reminding me how important it is to be patient during trying times. Thank you for teaching me to be humble during life's highs.
You are a fighter. You are a friend. You are thoughtful. You are beautiful. You are wise. You are laughter. You are grace. More importantly, you are all the qualities I hope to embody.
One day in the distant future, when and if I am lucky enough to have a daughter of my own, I know she will look at me as if I hung the moon and all the earth's stars. I will tell her it wasn't me, but her grandmother.
Mom, I will like you forever and love you for always.
Your daughter
