In case all the commercials and email blasts haven’t clued you in, Mother’s Day is coming up. I’d like to share a slightly different spin on why you should celebrate that special woman in your life.
If you only have 30 seconds, let me just say I sincerely hope neither you nor your loved ones ever have to stoop to passing off a Mother’s Day card written by a cat. But if you have 3 minutes, read on!
Once upon a time, my husband and I lived in Chicago – NOT the suburbs. Actual Chicago: Lakeview. We could walk to see a Cubs game.
{Brief pause to reflect on how awesome it was to live in the city}
….aaaand in Chicago, we had a neighbor, Ben*. Ben was an around awesome dude. He was nice, funny, a great wingman, loved beer, and could tolerate relentless harrassment about being Canadian – i.e. the total package.
But Ben had a flaw – namely, his choice of wife. The guy had married a gal who was cuckoo-for-cocoa-puffs. Crazy. She could be a boatload of fun (the way nuts usually are) but sadly, the fun was usually short lived: since she was the definition of high maintenance.
And one day we stumbled across Ben’s sad way of coping with her nuttiness:
It was early May. My husband and I were shopping and encountered Ben checking out at Barnes & Noble (at Fullerton and Halsted – I swear we lived in the city). Ben was shopping for Mother’s Day cards at the time. Nothing unusual with that, but I noticed a pile of Mother’s Day cards on the counter in front of him. I asked where he was sending so many cards.
“Ah. They’re all for Jess*“, he said, as the cashier rang him up.
“Are you stocking up for the next few years?” I asked, confused.
“No, they’re all for this year. Jess likes to get one from everyone in the family because it’s such an important day. So one is from me, one from Emmie” (at the time, Emmie was 6 months old), “one is from Mo, one is from my Mom…”
“Wait.” I had to stop him, “Mo??”
(Friends, Mo was their cat – and note, I am leaving aside the fact that (1) she required a card from a 6 month old and (2) her mother in law, a demand reserved for those with extreme levels of hutzpah).
“Yup.” he smiled and flashed a thumbs up at the cashier (so Canadian).
I blurted the first thought in my head: “How the hell do you write a Mother’s Day card from a cat?”
He looked at me, with a look of innocent, henpecked variety surprise, “Oh, I scribble it the way it would look if Mo were forced to hold a pen. Then I stamp it at the end by pressing his little paw on an ink pad.”
The Takeaway
I’m guessing most married people will quickly recognize a classic case of Mother’s Day insanity – which unfortunately in his case, was a permanent case.
And (hopefully) they can see their situation is waaaay better.
Thus Ben’s story while sad, will serve to make Mother’s Day seem like a great day to celebrate the awesome, less-crazy-than-Jess woman in their life.
Know anyone like Jess? Do tell! And if you don’t, fear not – she’s out there. Just look for a poor schmuck – possibly checking out at Barnes & Noble.
* All names have been changed to protect the bat@#$ crazy, or anyone who might become their target, if said crazies felt they were being mocked in this article (me). Oops, except for Mo’s.
