Pat and Vivian

My children have two grandmothers, my mom, Pat, and Jamie's mom, Vivian. Jamie's mom passed away before my children were born. My boys have been blessed to know my mother. She is their last living grandparent. We don't see her as much as we'd like to due to overly busy schedules on our part and an impediment in the form of the Long Island Expressway and typically horrendous traffic.

Vivian was an interesting lady. She was a mom, first and foremost. She adored her son. I still to this day tease Jamie about his mom. "My son, my son," it was her mantra. She was a chef at the Linden Tree in Huntington, New York who lived in a house with two picky eaters, aka meat and potato eaters. I feel her pain. I can't say that she was necessarily pleased when Jamie got engaged. It wasn't the idea that he was marrying me, it was that he was marrying at all. We married in 1990. She succumbed to colon cancer in 1993. When the bishop visited her to administer last rites, he asked her what was holding her on this earth as she was dying. She said I want to meet my grandchildren. That didn't happen. At least, not in the typical way.

By hook or by crook, she met her grandchildren. Before I write this next section, please understand that I am a very normal person by most standards and for the most part, relatively sane. I can tell you without a doubt, that at one point in our house, when Joe was crawling through the kitchen, the pocket door magically closed before he fell down the step and that I would go into the kids' rooms and tell Vivian that the boys needed to sleep, so please stop playing with the toys. Toys that had heretofore started making noise on their own would suddenly fall silent. 

If you think that your loved ones are gone, think again. I can tell you many stories about the presence of loved ones who have passed making their presence known in our lives. The signs are always there. We just don't recognize the signs for what they are. 

My mom is a pretty amazing woman. She hasn't won any Nobel prizes but her efforts at maintaining a civil relationship with some of the in-laws would rival the best efforts of Carter/Sadat/Begin at Camp David. Seriously. She gave her kids a work ethic. Need I say more? My sons know when Nanny is coming for a visit because I start baking Irish soda bread. They love her quiet laugh, her quiet happiness sitting by the fireplace, watching a movie with a cup of tea and a slice of Irish soda bread.

It was from her that the importance of education was impressed upon me. I have passed that goal onto my children. You will do the best you can. You will work hard. It's really the most simple of life's tenets and probably the most important life lessons you can pass onto your children.

So this Mother's Day 2011, the eighteenth anniversary of the passing of Jamie's mom, thank you to Vivian aka Grandma Vivian and thank you to Pat aka Nanny. You were and are amazing mothers and grandmothers. I strive every day to live up to your example as a mother and one day hope to experience the joy of being a grandmother, aka spoil the kids and send them home when they get cranky or I've had enough.

Call your mother! Happy Mother's Day!