May brings sunshine and flowers, and a new energy to the Northeast. It also brings us Mother’s Day. Of course, every day should be Mother’s Day, but that’s another column.

        I was pondering what to write here when I thought of my wife, Asta, and her experience in becoming a mother. I remember how she was consumed with fear as her pregnancy progressed toward delivery. As part of her family dynamics, she had had very little, if any, experience with newborns, including holding one. In addition, she was just about to enter her forties, so she had a lot going on. Reading, talking, getting advice, going to classes—everything leading up to delivery was just a fog that covered up her insecurities. Having moved from Lithuania, she had no family around the corner and only a small circle of friends to lean on. I understood just how tough it was for her. I’m sure that, despite me being there, she most likely felt alone at times. I know she was frightened—of child birth, of motherhood, of the future. Everything about taking care of a newborn “scares me to pieces,” she would tell me.

        It’s amazing to watch nine months of motherhood, and the miracle of birth take place. Every one of those memories reminds me to pay attention or you might miss something important. A few false hospital trips added to the ongoing anxiety, but eventually we got there, and two new persons emerged—a mother and a son.

        That there is an inborn, innate ability to be a mother, to know just what to do as a mother, is hard to believe, but it is true. When a child is born, a mother is born too. If you have ever been in a delivery room when a new baby is put in a mother’s arms, there is an energy that takes over. Love almost takes on an energy of existence that you can reach out and touch. Time seems to stop, and pure love enters the room, no barriers, no thoughts, just an overwhelming feeling of love, of motherhood. It is still the only time in my life that I can identify as really being in the moment, and that experience is priceless.

        Asta became a new person that day. Like all of us, she has experienced the twisting roads of learning to be a parent. Since then my wife has built this unbelievable and indestructible foundation for our family through a mother’s love, and that love is why it should be Mother’s Day every day. Although this is a personal story it really is no different than millions of stories. Mothers deliver every day, in nurturing, caring for, and loving us.

              Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers…and to all who care for others with a mother kind of love.

 Joe