Ode to My Mother by Margaret Hart

My mother is a courageous and resilient woman. Characteristics she inherited from her mother, who, as a young war widow of a captain in the merchant marine, raised my mother and her sister with lots of love and steely determination. My mother never knew her father, who was killed when she was five years old. Despite growing up without him, she had a wonderful childhood, and talks often about the good times in the house on Hartington Road, in Aberdeen, Scotland.

My mother is adventurous and embraces life. When she was a teenager, she went on a motorcycle trip to France with a friend. She loves to tell me that story. I still have the Belgian lace she gave me that she acquired on that trip. When she was 22, my mother went on an adventure that changed her life forever. She traveled to the United States for the first time to visit relatives. Soon after she arrived in Glens Falls, New York, she was swept off her feet by the boy next door, and the rest is history.

My mother is confident and determined. In her early 40s, in the midst of raising two daughters (one with special needs) and working full time, she went back to school, first earning her GED, then her Bachelor’s Degree, and finally, her Master’s Degree in Special Education. She also became a U.S. Citizen.

Over the years, my mother has taught me, by example, what it means to be courageous and resilient, to be adventurous and to embrace life, to have confidence in myself and my abilities, and to never give up—and so much more. I am so grateful to my mom for all the gifts she has given me.  On June 9th, when she turns 75, I will celebrate my mother, and make sure to tell her how much she has shaped who I am as a woman, and as a mother myself, and how much that means to me.

Happy Birthday, Mom! I love you.

Tags: birthdays, embracing life, having confidence, life lessons, love, Margaret Hart, motherhood