This time of year I get really annoyed by the overwhelming resence of "BUY for MOM! Remember MOM!" commercialization. I sit in my car and sing the slow, old, mournful "Sometimes I feel like a motherless child" spiritual, or at least sing it in my head. There's nothing I could buy my mom, she died almost 5 years ago from ALS. It's not like I could forget her, I AM her daughter in many ways. As are various of my nieces, and my sister, too.

I feel badly for other people whose mothers are either gone, or who were tragically bad at being mothers. People who never had a real mom. Women who have struggled tearfully, unsuccesfully for years to be moms. People still struggling against destructive family relationships - how must they all feel? Worse than me, I'm sure.

Then I am glad, because we will visit Paul's mom on Mother's Day, and she is alive and well. And she got her present already - I ordered it early so it could get there in time without overnight rush charges, and she got it in three days, not the ten days they said it'd take!