To: Mom

I was talking with a friend the other day and sharing how my sense of humor was shaped from my youth. My brothers and myself picked up this sense of humor from moms. When my parents split we all lived in a 2 bedroom townhome. This was the place that we called home. It may have seemed cramped to some families, but it was our refuge and place of laughter. We (Mom, my two bros and myself)used to sleep in the same room on rainy nights and laugh hysterically. Each one of us would go around and tell stories that we pulled out of thin air. We would laugh and laugh, I smile just thinking about it. This wonderful woman who raised us made mistakes, but she definitely made some lasting impacts in our lives as well. My mother taught us how to laugh at life, how to not take ourselves to seriously and showed us through her example that when the world crumbles around you that you can either continually wallow in sorrow or you can live life.

This intelligent, English major didn't just teach us to laugh at our humanity but she taught us how to be quick witted. You had to learn how to sling cunning remarks back or else you wouldn't last at the dinner table. The reason we stuck olives on the ends of our fingers at Thanksgiving dinner was because mom was leading the pack!
This may sound childish and crude, but she knew where to drew the line and in what setting she needed to be prim and proper. I just want to honor her today for raising three children all on her own, working her butt off and still keeping her wits. Mom, we didn't turn out to deranged right?