JESSE IHDE

There are a few people in this world with such distinction as my mother.  And every person who has wandered across her path would tell you the same story…

She stopped everything to listen to my story.  She patted my arm and made sure I felt safe, accepted and loved.  Then she offered me a warm meal, a cold drink and a place in her heart.  I immediately felt like I belonged; both to her and to something greater than the relationship between us but a source of love I could only call divine. 

She is an unconventional woman who redefined giving.  Damn the notion of ten percent! Go all in with people!  She has cried with the woman who takes our dry cleaning, with the waitress who accidentally poured a pitcher of water in her lap, with my gay friends whose own parents gave them no safe refuge in the midst of their storm and confusion and many other wounded souls who could not resist her warmth, her love, her strength and gentleness.  I grew up knowing the woman who cleaned our home was our friend, not our employee, because we loved her and fed her and invited her children over to play.

My mother is a beautiful woman, breath-taking really.  She will catch you by surprise when you see her face and make assumptions about what a woman who looks like her must be like in real life.  Some people miss her because they cannot stand for someone so lovely on the outside to be even more stunning on the inside.  But if you make space for her, even takes a glimpse into the beautiful brown eyed girl, you will open the door to a complicated, creative, intelligent, thoughtful, caring and compassionate woman.  You will think, “I want to be like her,” just like I did.

Few people truly create a legacy, one that isn’t about achievement but a real reflection of true others-ness. “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” –Maya Angelou

Happy Mother’s Day to the woman who, more than any other, made me feel loved.