Mothering

It is Mother's Day....and I wish to honor all those who provide unconditional love, influence, guidance and joy....be they Mothers, Grandmothers, Aunts, Mentoring Friends, Teachers, Step-Children, Co-Workers....

So many of us are not *Mothers* in the strictest, Webster's Dictionary sense of the word but we *Mother* each and every day. To our children, our neighbor's children, our extended families, our pets, our nieces and nephews, our co-workers, our students, our friends. We nurture our families, our friends or even a cause we believe in. Is this not *mothering*?

We, as women, have the capacity to love and care for, without fail, all those in need be they human, animal or even an idea...a thought. We can *mother* symbolically as well as *mother* in the flesh. There are many who need us....so many for whom we care. This love does not need to be selfless, or self denying. For most women, this love for others, *mothering* if you will, is pure empowerment.

We celebrate *mothering* in every sense of the word...and we celebrate all of us, as mothers, in every sense of that word.

moth·er1 /ˈmʌðər/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[muhth-er] –noun 1. a female parent. 2. (often initial capital letter) one's female parent. 3. a mother-in-law, stepmother, or adoptive mother. 4. a term of address for a female parent or a woman having or regarded as having the status, function, or authority of a female parent. 5. a term of familiar address for an old or elderly woman. 6. mother superior. 7. a woman exercising control, influence, or authority like that of a mother: to be a mother to someone. 8. the qualities characteristic of a mother, as maternal affection: It is the mother in her showing itself. 9. something or someone that gives rise to or exercises protecting care over something else; origin or source. 10. (in disc recording) a mold from which stampers are made. –adjective 11. being a mother: a mother bird. 12. of, pertaining to, or characteristic of a mother: mother love. 13. derived from or as if from one's mother; native: his mother culture. 14. bearing a relation like that of a mother, as in being the origin, source, or protector: the mother company and its affiliates; the mother computer and its network of terminals. –verb (used with object) 15. to be the mother of; give origin or rise to. 16. to acknowledge oneself the author of; assume as one's own. 17. to care for or protect like a mother; act maternally toward. –verb (used without object) 18. to perform the tasks or duties of a female parent; act maternally: a woman with a need to mother. —Idiom 19. mother of all, the greatest or most notable example of: the mother of all mystery novels. —Synonyms 17. tend, nurse, mind, raise.

Today I honor my own Mother and Bill's late Mother with these words....

A father may turn his back on his child; brothers and sisters may become inveterate enemies; husbands may desert their wives and wives their husbands. But a mother's love endures through all; in good repute, in bad repute, in the face of the world's condemnation, a mother still loves on, and still hopes that her child may turn from his evil ways, and repent; still she remembers the infant smiles that once filled her bosom with rapture, the merry laugh, the joyful shout of his childhood, the opening promise of his youth; and she can never be brought to think him all unworthy. A mother is the truest friend we have, when trials, heavy and sudden, fall upon us; when adversity takes the place of prosperity; when friends who rejoice with us in our sunshine, desert us when troubles thicken around us, still will she cling to us, and endeavor by her kind precepts and counsels to dissipate the clouds of darkness, and cause peace to return to our hearts.

~Washington Irving