My Mom is the beautiful one in the middle. Circa 1993.

My childhood seems really far away, like a place you have been but that fades the farther away you drive until you almost can’t tell if it’s real or just a mirage, conceived in the tender parts of your mind that will always long to return.

(That was a long sentence. I’m sorry).

If anything made my childhood a happy one, it was my mom. She fought to protect the golden walls of innocence that shield a child’s mind from the daunting, the dark and the disappointing. The weeks after we moved into the house my parents have been renting for almost the last two decades, we’d all sit on the kitchen floor and eat chips ‘n salsa for lunch. Mom would curl up next to us, sitting Indian style, as we made a mess of the kitchen floor and usually ourselves. Salsa is messy stuff if you do it right.

I never thought about who cleaned up that mess – I would just run off to play.

Many of our mothers, whatever their failures might be, were the most shining example of sacrifice and love in our lives growing up, and continue to be as we become adults or have our own children. (And can I just say that facebook is getting more and more cluttered with pictures of my friends’ babies. I love children. I’m sure I love your children. But, like… seriously guys. Seriously).

I couldn’t be home for Mother’s Day this year and it made me realize how much I miss my mom. It also made me realize how God has used other women in my life to temporarily step in and take care of me. Because, frankly, everyone needs a mom around.

Despite massive cultural differences and language gaps, I have noticed a few commonalities between mothers. In honor of my mom, my stand-in mothers, and every woman who has birthed and raised a child, here it is: UNIVERSAL MOTHERISMS. Continue reading →