Thanks Mom, for all unseen things you do
This column was originally published in 2012.
Dear Readers: Happy Mother’s Day. Please phone your mother, grandmother, mother-in-law, stepmother or foster mother and wish them the best. And please don’t forget those for whom this day, for whatever reason, is filled with sadness. Give them a call and say you are thinking of them.
Dear Annie: I read this years ago and thought it would be a nice addition for Mother’s Day. Will you print it again?
— Jennie in Ohio
Dear Jennie: With pleasure. It’s one of our favourites:
Mom and Dad were watching TV when Mom said, “I’m tired and it’s getting late. I think I’ll go to bed.”
She went to the kitchen to make sandwiches for the next day’s lunches, rinsed the popcorn bowls, took meat out of the freezer for supper the following evening, checked the cereal box levels, filled the sugar container, put spoons and bowls on the table and set up the coffee pot for brewing the next morning. She then put some wet clothes into the dryer, sewed on a loose button, picked up the newspapers strewn on the floor and the game pieces left on the table and put the telephone book back into the drawer. She watered the plants, emptied a wastebasket, hung up a towel to dry, wrote a note to the teacher and counted out some cash for the kids’ field trip. She signed a birthday card for a friend, addressed and stamped the envelope and wrote a quick reminder for the grocery store.
Mom washed her face, brushed and flossed her teeth. Her husband called, “I thought you were going to bed.” “I’m on my way,” she replied. She looked in on each of the children, turned out a bedside lamp, hung up a shirt, and threw some dirty socks in the hamper. In her own room, she set the alarm, laid out clothes for the next day and added three chores to her list of things to do.
About that time, her husband turned off the TV and announced to no one in particular, “I’m going to bed,” and he did.
Annie’s Mailbox is written by Kathy Mitchell and Marcy Sugar, longtime editors of the Ann Landers column.